A new electrochemical procedure for electrosynthesis of organic carbonates from CO 2 and alcohols has been established in CO 2 -saturated room temperature ionic liquid BMIMBF 4 solution, followed by addition of an alkylating agent. The synthesis was carried out under mild (P CO 2 =1.0 atm, T = 55 uC) and safe conditions. The use of volatile and toxic solvents and catalysts as well as of any additional supporting electrolytes has been avoided. The influence of temperature, cathode material, working potential, alcohol concentration and the charge passed on the reaction using methanol (1a) as the model compound was examined. The ionic liquid used for the reaction was recyclable. The obtained results showed that the primary and secondary alcohols were converted in good yields, whereas tertiary alcohol and phenol were unreactive.

Morphology-controlled CuO nanoparticles for electroreduction of CO2 with an excellent selectivity for ethanol.

Non-noble metal oxides consisting of CuO and TiO 2 (CuO/TiO 2 catalyst) for CO 2 reduction were fabricated using a simple hydrothermal method. The designed catalysts of CuO could be in situ reduced to a metallic Cu-forming Cu/TiO 2 catalyst, which could efficiently catalyze CO 2 reduction to multi-carbon oxygenates (ethanol, acetone, and n-propanol) with a maximum overall faradaic efficiency of 47.4% at a potential of −0.85 V vs. reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE) in 0.5 M KHCO 3 solution. The catalytic activity for CO 2 electroreduction strongly depends on the CuO contents of the catalysts as-prepared, resulting in different electrochemistry surface areas. The significantly improved CO 2 catalytic activity of CuO/TiO 2 might be due to the strong CO 2 adsorption ability.

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