Novel solid oxide electrochemical cell for simultaneous processing of carbon dioxide and ethane

This paper presents a novel solid oxide cell (SOC) for the simultaneous electroreduction of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) to carbon monoxide (CO), and electro-oxidative dehydrogenation (e-ODH) of ethane (C 2 H 6 ) to ethylene (C 2 H 4 ). The SOC consisted of a cobalt (Co)-infiltrated Gd 0.1 Ce 0.9 O 1.95 (GDC10) cathode and a SrFeO 3-x -infiltrated (Y 2 O 3 ) 0.08 (ZrO 2 ) 0.92 (YSZ8) anode. The electrochemical performance of the SOC was evaluated at 750 °C under five different current densities: 0.10, 0.15, 0.20, 0.25, and 0.30 A·cm −2 . Additionally, the polarization curve for this SOC was compared to polarization curves obtained when operating the cell as a solid oxide electrolyzer cell (SOEC) for CO 2 electroreduction and as a SOC for C 2 H 6 e-ODH. The results demonstrated the feasibility of the proposed SOC by reducing the energy required for CO 2 electroreduction while simultaneously producing value-added products, i.e., CO at the cathode and C 2 H 4 at the anode. At 0.20 A·cm −2 , the CO production rate at the cathode reached 1.49 ml.min −1 .cm −2 , achieving a Faradaic efficiency of 98 %. Concurrently, at the anode, C 2 H 6 conversion, C 2 H 4 selectivity, and C 2 H 4 yield were 4.8 %, 87.8 %, and 4.2 %, respectively. • A novel solid oxide cell for simultaneous CO 2 electroreduction and C 2 H 6 electro-oxidative dehydrogenation is presented. • The cell's electrochemical performance was evaluated from 0.10 to 0.30 A·cm −2 in 0.05 A·cm −2 increments. • At 0.20 A·cm −2 , CO 2 electroreduction Faradaic efficiency was 98 % while C 2 H 6 conversion, C 2 H 4 selectivity, and C 2 H 4 yield were 4.8 %, 87.8 %, and 4.2 %, respectively. • The cell demonstrated feasibility by reducing energy required for CO 2 electroreduction and simultaneously producing CO and C 2 H 4 .