We hear from Hui Luo, Georg Kastlunger, Ifan E. L. Stephens, and Magda Titirici about their groundbreaking study in the latest issue of EES Catalysis, titled ‘Selective glycerol to lactic acid conversion via a tandem effect between platinum and metal oxides with abundant acid groups‘ to gain deeper insight into their groundbreaking work.

Selective glycerol to lactic acid conversion via a tandem effect between platinum and metal oxides with abundant acid groups

What inspired you to focus on the selective conversion of glycerol to lactic acid?

Hui: “The reaction of glycerol transformation is a very complex process. Dozens of different products can be formed, depending on the reaction conditions. It is important to identify the products that are of high-value and useful. Therefore, before starting the project we reviewed the glycerol product’s market in addition to receiving industrial feedback. This is how we learned that among all products, lactic acid has good value combined with relatively large market size and therefore we started to focus research on the selectively of converting glycerol to lactic acid.”

Can you explain the significance of using platinum and metal oxides in your catalyst design?

Hui: “Traditionally, Pt on carbon is used as the electrocatalyst for glycerol oxidation, while metal oxides are used in thermal catalysis. During our research we concluded that glycerol-to-lactic acid conversion is a combination of electrochemical + thermochemical catalysis. Hence, we took inspirations from both research fields and designed a tandem catalytic system, which doubled the lactic acid selectivity. Such discovery shows the importance of thinking “out of the box” and seeking inspiration from different research fields.”

What were the biggest challenges you faced during this research?

Hui: “The biggest challenge we faced was identifying the intermediate compound, dihydroxyacetone. Because it is highly unstable in an alkaline environment, we were not able to probe it directly. However, combining our experiments with theoretical calculations, we were able to prove the tandem effect happening at the Pt and metal oxide interface. We are actively working on resolving this challenge by combining different in-operando techniques, which will be shared in our future works.”

How did you determine the optimal conditions for the tandem effect between platinum and metal oxides?

Georg: “We already knew that platinum under alkaline conditions is an excellent catalyst for glycerol electrooxidation. To achieve improved selectivity towards lactic acid, our initial hypothesis, based on literature for thermal catalysis, was that we would need acidic catalytic sites.

We probed our hypothesis by investigating composite catalysts based on a combination of metal oxides with different acidic strengths and Pt. We performed theoretical calculations based on quantum mechanical simulations to investigate the catalytic conversion step by step. This way we could prove the correlation of selectivity towards lactic acid with the acidity by defining simplified descriptors for screening for optimised catalysts.”

Could you elaborate on the key findings of your study?

Georg and Hui: “Platinum is the most investigated catalyst for the oxidation of glycerol. However, its metallic nature favours the pure electrochemical oxidation path to highly oxidized products such as glyceric acid and other small organic acids. Lactic acid is a partially oxidized C3 product which necessitates a series of intramolecular conversions when produced from glycerol. Thus, to achieve improved selectivity towards lactic acid, we need to “isolate” partially oxidized intermediates from the Pt active sites and provide catalytic sites for the non-electrochemical conversion, such as oxides rich in Lewis acid groups. To tune the ability of capturing intermediate products, the oxide’s binding affinity can be optimized by increasing the acidity of its sites. This tuning factor, however, with the competing tendency for oxidation of the oxide’s active sites, correlating with their acidity as well.

Combining experimental and theoretical results, we have elucidated the reaction mechanism demonstrating that Pt alone has a poor selectivity towards lactic acid due to its tendency to undergo a pure electrochemical process that produce a mixture of acids. Furthermore, we demonstrated that the surface acidity of certain metal oxide catalysts is crucial for shifting the reaction towards the dehydration pathway occurring via binding and catalysing the dihydroxyacetone intermediate.”

How does your work improve the efficiency and selectivity of lactic acid production compared to previous methods?

Hui: “By benchmarking our performance with previous methods, we can say that our selectivity is among the highest reported so far. Recently there are a few more studies in this field that combine precious metal catalysts and metal oxides to improve lactic acid selectivity, and we are glad to see our hypothesis validated and proven by other researchers.”

What potential applications do you see for your findings in the industry?

Ifan: “Lactic used in its lactide form is the precursor for producing poly(lactic) acid which is the most used biodegradable plastic for consumer goods. Hui conducted a high level technoeconomic analysis, which showed the superiority of electrochemical methods vs fermentation for lactic acid production, provided that renewable energy is used. In addition, the coproduction of hydrogen on the positive electrode increases the economic value of the overall process. Apart from evolving hydrogen, the glycerol electrooxidation could also be coupled with other electroreduction reactions such as CO2 to ethylene, yielding increased economic value.”

Are there any future research directions or improvements you are planning to explore?

Ifan and Magda: “We plan to improve the selectivity towards lactic acid at higher current densities further by using different substrates such as nickel foam. In addition, more direct spectroscopic proof of the reaction pathway that leads to lactic acid production on acidic sites would allow us to develop even more targeted synthesis routes. It would also be useful to get a better understanding and control of mesocopic effects relative to surface catalysis.”

What impact do you hope your research will have on the field?

Magda: “The impact will be in the academic community working on waste to chemicals and in electrocatalysis, on alcohols electrooxidation. It has generated new knowledge on factors controlling the selectivity of alcohol oxidations to partially oxidised products and the knowledge could be translated to other, more complex biomass oxidation reactions of interest for a circular economy and biobased products.”

How do we discover new energy solutions?   EES Catalysis publishes high quality research on energy and environmental catalysis. It delivers the same impact and influence that researchers associate with our Energy & Environmental Science brand. As a multidisciplinary platform, the journal covers catalysis in all subject areas like chemistry, materials science and engineering. At its core, EES Catalysis aligns with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7 – to ensure access to affordable, reliable and modern energy for all.   Find out more https://rsc.li/EESCatalysis

How do we discover new energy solutions? EES Catalysis delivers the same impact and influence that researchers associate with our Energy & Environmental Science brand. As a multidisciplinary platform, the journal covers catalysis in all subject areas like chemistry, materials science and engineering. At its core, EES Catalysis aligns with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 7) – to ensure access to affordable, reliable and modern energy for all.

To hear more about EES Catalysis, as well as the future news and issue alerts, sign up for e-alerts here.

Editor Spotlight: Susan Habas

Susan Habas, at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, USA, is one of our Associate Editors handling the peer review of submitted manuscripts. Her research has focused on developing new catalyst materials with tailored active sites and understanding the evolution of these sites under realistic operating conditions. The growing importance of translating innovative catalytic technologies for renewable products to industry, highlights the need for this level of understanding in scalable catalyst materials and integrated systems. In her opinion, designing catalysts that can be readily incorporated into real systems, and understanding and mitigating catalyst deactivation in the presence of common contaminants, will help accelerate adoption of these new technologies.

As such, she is always excited to handle papers that address the design of new materials for thermocatalytic and electrocatalytic applications, as well as multi-scale characterization of integrated catalytic systems for the journal. Her vision is that EES Catalysis becomes the go-to source for fundamental studies that enable the transition to applied catalysis.

Publish with EES Catalysis and receive a number of benefits including:

• Free Gold Open Access publication – all article processing charges are waived until mid-2025
• Rapid times to publication – our average time to decision for peer-reviewed manuscripts is just 24 days
• Flexible article types with no word count restrictions or colour changes
• Broad readership: our global audience provides maximum exposure for your work
• Publicity on Twitter and WeChat for featured articles

We would be delighted to hear from you if you are interested in submitting to the journal or if you would like any further information. If you are interested in publishing your next paper with us, please contact the journal directly so that we can send you an invited submission link.

Realising the Double Benefit of Selective Ethane Activation

Descriptor-based identification of bimetallic-derived catalysts for selective activation of ethane with CO2

Haoyue Guo, Zhenhua Xie, Xuelong Wang, Jingguang G. Chen and Ping Liu

EES. Catal., 2023,1, 17-25 DOI D2EY00051B

An interview with the authors

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment and what do you find most challenging about your research?

For simultaneously upgrading CO2 and C2 light alkanes into different types of important industrial feedstocks, it is important to control the selective scission of C-H/C-C bonds in alkanes. It is challenging due to the structural complexity of catalysts. By using combined approaches of in situ characterization and DFT calculations, our research can lead to the discovery of active sites for effective catalysts for CO2-assisted alkane activation.

How do you feel about EES Catalysis as a place to publish research on this topic?

As a new EES journal with a focus on catalysis, EES Catalysis is an ideal journal to share cutting edge research for catalysis related to energy and environment.

Novel Catalyst for Efficient Hydrogen Production from Formic Acid

Boosting the activity of PdAg alloy nanoparticles during H2 production from formic acid induced by CrOx as an inorganic interface modifier

Kohsuke Mori, Tatsuya Fujita and Hiromi Yamashita

EES. Catal., 2023,1, 84-93 DOI D2EY00049K

Meet the authors

Kohsuke Mori received his PhD degree from the Graduate School of Engineering Science at Osaka University in 2003. In 2004, he joined at University of California, Berkeley, as a postdoctoral fellow. He moved to the current faculty in 2005 and then became an associate professor in 2009. His current research interests focus on metal and alloy nanoparticle catalysts to establish clean and environmentally-friendly carbon-neural processes, hybrid photocatalysts based on visible-light-responsible MOF, and the fabrication of catalytic reactor by 3D printing technique.

Tatsuya Fujita received his bachelor’s degree from the School of Engineering at Osaka University in 2022. He is now a first grade of master course student in Graduate School of Engineering at Osaka University. His research topic is the development of highly efficient heterogeneous catalysts for the use of formic acid as a promising hydrogen energy carrier.

Hiromi Yamashita has been a professor at Osaka University since 2004. He received a PhD degree from Kyoto University in 1987. He was an assistant professor at Tohoku University and an associate professor at Osaka Prefecture University. He was also a visiting research fellow at the California Institute of Technology. He is now the president of Catalysis Society of Japan (2019–2020) and the president of Asia-Pacific Association of Catalysis Societies (2019–2022). His research interests include the design of single-site photocatalysts and nanostructured catalysts.

An interview with the authors

What aspect of your work are you most excited about at the moment and what do you find most challenging about your research?

The most exciting thing is to discover something unexpected but really new, and the most difficult thing is to observe the actual catalytic reaction and imagine what is true.

How do you feel about EES Catalysis as a place to publish research on this topic?

We believe EES Catalysis will provide a powerful platform for presenting cutting-edge research in this fascinating area.

Can you share one piece of career-related advice or wisdom with other, early career scientists?

To do what you want and trust your intuition no matter what.

A Promising Strategy for the Synthesis of Energy Efficient Syngas

Direct carbonate electrolysis into pure syngas

Yurou Celine Xiao, Christine M. Gabardo, Shijie Liu, Geonhui Lee, Yong Zhao, Colin P. O’Brien, Rui Kai Miao, Yi Xu, Jonathan P. Edwards, Mengyang Fan, Jianan Erick Huang, Jun Li, Panagiotis Papangelakis, Tartela Alkayyali, Armin Sedighian Rasouli, Jinqiang Zhang, Edward H. Sargent and David Sinton.

EES. Catal., 2023,1, 54-61 DOI D2EY00046F

Meet the authors

David Sinton is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto and Canada Research Chair. The Sinton group develops fluid systems for applications in energy and analysis. The group is application-driven and is currently developing fluid systems to produce renewable fuels from CO2 and to develop energy efficient industrial working fluids. Dr. Sinton is a Fellow of the Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Engineering Institute of Canada, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Canadian Academy of Engineering, and Royal Society of Canada.

Yurou Celine Xiao is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Mechanical & Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto. Celine’s research is focused on systems design for energy efficient carbon dioxide capture and utilization. She is a recipient of the Hatch Graduate Scholarship for Sustainable Energy Research and the Bert Wasmund Graduate Fellowships in Sustainable Energy Research.

Missed our EES Catalysis First Issue webinar? Watch it back here as our authors and board members discuss the work published in our first issue.

Find out more about EES Catalysis on our webpage and submit your manuscript here.

Discover the first issue: EES Catalysis

2 March 2023, 13:00 (UK time)

Our upcoming webinar is your chance to discover EES Catalysis. Whether you’re curious about the energy and environmental catalysis research contained in our first issue, or are looking for the right place to publish your own discoveries, join us on 2 March to hear from the authors, researchers and editorial board members.

Tune in to the webinar on YouTube or LinkedIn!

What will the webinar cover?

Join the people behind the first issue of EES Catalysis to:

• hear our inaugural editorial board present their highlights from issue one
• see interviews with the authors, including Professor Kazunari Domen, Professor Kazuhide Kamiya and Ms Celine Xiao
• find out more about EES Catalysis – and discover a home for your own exceptional research

Start exploring EES Catalysis

The first issue of EES Catalysis is ready for you to discover. You’ll find excellent, innovative research on photo-, thermal and electrocatalysis, with great significance towards achieving energy security and zero carbon emission – all free to read online. Read the first issue here.

We look forward you joining us.

We are delighted to welcome Professor Susan Habas from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), USA, as an Associate Editor for EES Catalysis, a new open access journal publishing high-quality research on energy and environmental catalysis.

Learn more about our new Associate Editor

Susan Habas is a Senior Scientist and Distinguished Member of Research Staff in the Catalytic Carbon Transformation and Scale-up Center at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). She received her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley with Prof. Peidong Yang in 2008. Following her postdoctoral research at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and NREL, Susan joined the NREL research staff in 2012. Her current work focuses on the development of innovative catalysts for selective transformations of renewable and waste carbon sources to fuels and chemicals.

Her interests include the design and synthesis of nanostructured catalysts with tailored surface chemistry, continuous flow methods for scalable synthesis and discovery of catalytic materials, and non-thermal plasma catalysis. She is a Principal Investigator in the Chemical Catalysis for Bioenergy Consortium, leading a multi-national laboratory effort to advance new synthetic approaches and operando characterization capabilities for catalytic systems.

Read one of Susan’s papers published by RSC below:

An investigation into support cooperativity for the deoxygenation of guaiacol over nanoparticle Ni and Rh₂P

Michael B. Griffin, Frederick G. Baddour, Susan E. Habas, Connor P. Nash, Daniel A. Ruddy and Joshua A. Schaidle 

Catal. Sci. Technol., 2017,7, 2954-2966

Please join us in welcoming Professor Habas to EES Catalysis.

EES Catalysis is open for submissions. Find out more on the journal webpage, sign up for email alerts or submit your manuscript now.

EES Catalysis has now published its first issue, which is available to read online. We are delighted to be sharing reflections from some of our first authors on their experience publishing with EES Catalysis and Open Access publishing.

Hear from our first authors:

Structural ordering enhances highly selective production of acetic acid from CO₂ at ultra-low potential

Peter et al. EES. Catal., 2023, Advance Article, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00081D

“The article I published was titled ‘Structural Ordering Enhances Highly Selective Production of Acetic Acid from CO₂ at Ultra-Low Potential’, and it provides a novel strategy to improve electrochemical performance towards the formation of high value-added chemicals selectively at ultra-low potential.

This work was reviewed originally in EES, which later recommended to transfer to EES: Catalysis after receiving the reports from the reviewers. I chose to publish my work in your journal because I was confident that it would be well-received by your readers. EES Catalysis even though new it’s focus is predominantly capturing research in the field of catalysis which is presently one of the pivotal solutions to global warming and I was confident that if I submitted my work to you, it would be given the respect and attention it deserved. Furthermore, I was impressed by the range of topics covered by your journal, and felt that my work would fit in nicely with the other articles published in it.

 I am a strong advocate of open access publishing. I believe that everyone should have the right to access knowledge, regardless of their ability to pay. Open access publishing makes it possible for anyone to access information and research, which can help bridge the gap between those who have access to resources and those who do not. This is an important step in creating a more equitable society and I am proud to be part of a journal that supports open access publishing”.

Ultra-high-rate CO₂ reduction reactions to multicarbon products with a current density of 1.7 A cm^-2 in neutral electrolytes

Nakanishi, Kamiya et al., EES. Catal., 2023,1, 9-16, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00035K

“In this paper, we have revealed the hidden potential of the standard catalyst for CO₂RR through macroscale design. This novel insight provides us with a general guideline for designing novel materials, such as catalysts and electrodes, because our electrodes are only composed of standard components.

Our record work has significant implications for various researchers, such as chemists, physicists and energy economists. More importantly, our work clearly shows that materials chemists should be interested because we need to be careful about the macroscale structure even when synthesising nanoscale catalysts”.

ZSM-5 confined Cr₁-O₄ active sites boost methane direct oxidation to C1 oxygenates under mild conditions

Xiao-Ming Cao and Yang Lou et al. EES. Catal., 2023, Advance Article, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00080F

“Transforming methane to high-value oxygenated products (like CH₃OH, HCCOH etc.) is highly attractive in the field of energy, environment and chemical engineering. Traditionally, methane conversion can be achieved through an indirect process that couples methane reforming and a Fischer-Tropsch synthesis but such an indirect route normally requires high pressures (up to 30 bar) and temperatures (1100-1300 K) with large energy inputs.

 In this present work, we report a ZSM-5 supported non-noble Cr single atom catalyst as a proof-of-concept catalyst (Cr₁/ZSM-5 SAC) with a unique Cr₁-O₄ entity as the active site to selectively and efficiently convert methane to HCOOH and other value-added C1 oxygenates under mild conditions. The catalytic performance of Cr₁/ZSM-5 SAC outperforms most reported state-of-the-art catalysts.

Energy & Environmental Science is an international and highly reputed journal in the field of energy and environmental catalysis. Hence, we believe that the newly launched EES Catalysis will be another highly reputed and international journal in this field. As a gold open access journal, we believe the published research work will be much more freely, easily and faster to spread in the research community, which will help create a barrierless innovation platform in the world.

 It was a very wonderful experience for publishing our work on EES Catalysis. The review period is very fast and the questions proposed by the peers are very professional. We believe that the open access publishing will be the new way to spread science to professional researchers and social publics”.

Boosting the activity of PdAG allow nanoparticles during H₂ production from formic acid induced by CrO_x as an inorganic interface modifier

Mori, Yamashita et al., EES. Catal., 2023,1, 84-93, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00049K

“Boosting the activity of PdAg alloy nanoparticles during H₂ production from formic acid induced by CrO_x as an inorganic interface modifier. The interfacial modification of PdAg nanoparticles with highly dispersed CrO_x boosts the dehydrogenation of formic acid with extremely high turnover number. We are sure that our findings are of immediate interest to catalysts design research readership aiming at realizing environmentally-friendly hydrogen release systems.

We are very happy to publish the latest research results in this memorable first volume. We believe EES Catalysis will provide a powerful platform for presenting cutting-edge research in this fascinating area. Being able to post links to open access articles on our home page is a very effective way to reach out to interested readers”.

Open to everyone. Impactful for all: our first issue is available to explore

How do we discover new energy and environmental catalysis solutions? Handpicked by our editors, the first issue of EES Catalysis, our new, gold open access journal, showcases high-quality research on energy and environmental catalysis. Read issue 1 now.

Issue 1 includes:

Introducing EES Catalysis

Shizhang Qiao

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 7-8, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY90001G

Ultra-high-rate CO₂ reduction reactions to multicarbon products with a current density of 1.7 A cm^-2 in neutral electrolytes

Asato Inoue, Takashi Harada, Shuji Nakanishi, Kazuhide Kamiya

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 9-16, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00035K

Descriptor-based identification of bimetallic-derived catalysts for selective oxidation of ethane with CO₂

Haoyue Guo, Zhenhua Xie, Xuelong Wang, Jingguang G. Chen, Ping Liu

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 17-25, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00051B

Zr-doped BaTaO₂N photocatalyst modified with Na-Pt cocatalyst for efficient hydrogen evolution and Z-scheme water splitting

Huihui Li, Junie Jhon M. Vequizo, Takashi Hisatomi, Mamiko Nakabayashi, Jiadong Xiao, Xiaoping Tao, Zhenhua Pang, Wenping Li, Shanshan Chen, Zheng Wang, Naoya Shibata, Akira Yamakata, Tsuyoshi Takata, Kazunari Domen

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 26-35, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00031H

Pit-embellished low-valent metal active sites customise CO₂ photoreduction to methanol

Wei Zhao, Miao Ding, Pengxin Yang, Qiang Wang, Kaifu Zhang, Xiaowen Zhan, Yu Yu, Qiquan Luo, Shan Gao, Jinlong Yang, Yi Xie

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 36-44, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00029F

High-efficiency electrosynthesis of urea over bacterial cellulose regulated Pd-Cu bimetallic catalyst

Shengbo Zhang, Jing Geng, Zhong Zhao, Meng Jin, Wenyi Li, Yixing Ye, Ke Li, Guozhong Wang, Yunxia Zhang, Huajie Yin, Haimin Zhang, Huijun Zhao

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 45-53, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00038E

Direct carbonate electrolysis into pure syngas

Yurou Celine Xiao, Christine M. Gabardo, Shijie Liu, Geonhui Lee, Yong Zhao, Colin P. O’Brien, Rui Kai Miao, Yi Xu, Jonathan P. Edwards, Mengyang Fan, Jianan Erick Huang, Jun Li, Panagiotis Papangelakis, Tartela Alkayyali, Armin Sedighian Rasouli, Jinqiang Zhang, Edward H. Sargent, David Sinton

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 54-61, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00046F

Fe-N/C catalysts with tunable mesoporous structures and carbon layer numbers reveal the role of interlayer CO₂ activation

Jinwoo Woo, June Sing Lim, Taejung Lim, Du San Baek, Jae Hyung Kim, Jong Hoon Lee, Hu Young Jeong, Chang Hyuck Choi, Sang Hoon Joo

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 62-73, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00055E

Effect of charge selective contacts on the quai Fermi level splitting of CuGa₃Se₅ thin film photocathodes for hydrogen evolution and methylviologen reduction

Ye Cheng, Chengcan Xiao, Behzad Mahmoudi, Roland Scheer, A. Wouter Maijenburg, Frank E. Osterloh

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 74-83, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00062H

Boosting the activity of PdAg alloy nanoparticles during H₂ production from formic acid induced by CrO_x as an inorganic interface modifier

Kohsuke Mori, Tatsuya Fujita, Hiromi Yamashita

EES Catal. 2023, 1, 84-93, DOI: 10.1039/D2EY00049K

Maximise the visibility of your research by publishing gold open access

All papers published in EES Catalysis will forever be free to read. We are waiving article processing charges (APCs) until mid-2025, so it is currently free to publish in for authors.

Submit your manuscript to EES Catalysis here!