Electrocatalytic Urea Production with Nitrate and CO₂ on a Ru‐Dispersed Co Catalyst

Abstract

Urea electrosynthesis from co‐electrolysis of NO3− and CO2 (UENC) provides an alternative route for realizing efficient and sustainable urea production. In this work, single‐atom Ru dispersed on Co (Ru1Co) is demonstrated as an effective and robust catalyst for the UENC. In situ spectroscopic measurements and theoretical simulations unravel the cooperative effect of Ru1 and Co sites to promote the UENC process via a tandem catalysis mechanism, where the Ru1 site activates the adsorption and hydrogenation of NO3− to form *NH2, while the Co site activates the adsorption and hydrogenation/deoxygenation of CO2 to form *CO. The generated *CO is then transferred from the Co site to the nearby Ru1 site which promotes the C─N coupling of *NH2 and *CO toward the urea formation. Strikingly, Ru1Co assembled in a flow cell shows the highest urea‐Faradaic efficiency of 50.1% with the corresponding urea yield rate of 22.34 mmol h−1 g−1 at −0.5 V (RHE), superior to most reported UENC catalysts for urea production.