A Bifunctional Catalyst for Green Ammonia Synthesis from Ubiquitous Air and Water.

Ammonia (NH ) is essential for modern agriculture and industry, and due to its high hydrogen density and no carbon emission, NH is also expected to be the next-generation of "clean" energy carrier. Herein, directly from air and water, the plasma-electrocatalytic reaction system for NH production, which combines two steps of plasma-air-to-NO and electrochemical NO reduction reaction (eNO RR) with a bifunctional catalyst, have been successfully established. Especially, the bifunctional catalyst of CuCo O /Ni can simultaneously promote the plasma-air-to-NO and eNO RR processes. The easy adsorption and activation of O by CuCo O /Ni greatly improve the NO production rate at the first step. Further, CuCo O /Ni can also resolve the over bonding of the key intermediate of *NO, and thus reduce the energy barrier of the second step of eNO RR. And finally, the "green" NH production achievs the excellent FE (96.8%) and high-record NH yield rate of 145.8 mg h cm with large partial current denstity (1384.7 mA cm ). Moreover, an enlarged self-made H-type electrolyzer improves the NH yield to be 3.6 g h , and the obtained NH is then rapidly converted to a solid of magnesium ammonium phosphate hexahydrate, which favors the easy storage and transportation of NH . This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.