skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: HCOOH decomposition on Pt(111): A DFT study

Journal Article · · Surface Science
 [1];  [1]
  1. Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI (United States)

Formic acid (HCOOH) decomposition on transition metal surfaces is important for hydrogen production and for its electro-oxidation in direct HCOOH fuel cells. HCOOH can decompose through dehydrogenation leading to formation of CO2 and H2 or dehydration leading to CO and H2O; because CO can poison metal surfaces, dehydrogenation is typically the desirable decomposition path. Here we report a mechanistic analysis of HCOOH decomposition on Pt(111), obtained from a plane wave density functional theory (DFT-PW91) study. We analyzed the dehydrogenation mechanism by considering the two possible pathways involving the formate (HCOO) or the carboxyl (COOH) intermediate. We also considered several possible dehydration paths leading to CO formation. We studied HCOO and COOH decomposition both on the clean surface and in the presence of other relevant co-adsorbates. The results suggest that COOH formation is energetically more difficult than HCOO formation. In contrast, COOH dehydrogenation is easier than HCOO decomposition. Here, we found that CO2 is the main product through both pathways and that CO is produced mainly through the dehydroxylation of the COOH intermediate.

Research Organization:
Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRC) (United States). Institute for Atom-efficient Chemical Transformations (IACT); Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, WI (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
Contributing Organization:
EMSL, a national scientific user facility at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL); the Center for Nanoscale Materials at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL); and the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)
Grant/Contract Number:
FG02-05ER15731; AC02-06CH11357; AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1406904
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1251783
Journal Information:
Surface Science, Vol. 648, Issue C; ISSN 0039-6028
Publisher:
ElsevierCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 46 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (50)

Connecting Biomass and Petroleum Processing with a Chemical Bridge journal July 2010
Heterogeneous catalytic transfer hydrogenation and its relation to other methods for reduction of organic compounds journal April 1985
Catalytic Generation of Hydrogen from Formic acid and its Derivatives: Useful Hydrogen Storage Materials journal May 2010
RuSn bimetallic catalysts for selective hydrogenation of levulinic acid to γ-valerolactone journal May 2012
High power density direct formic acid fuel cells journal May 2004
Fuel crossover in direct formic acid fuel cells journal May 2007
Recent advances in direct formic acid fuel cells (DFAFC) journal July 2008
Erratum to: Sustainable energy: a review of formic acid electrochemical fuel cells journal December 2011
Linear free energy relationships for C1-oxygenate decomposition on transition metal surfaces journal January 1991
Screening of PdM and PtM catalysts in a multi-anode direct formic acid fuel cell journal March 2011
Platinum-Based Nanostructured Materials: Synthesis, Properties, and Applications journal June 2010
Surface science studies of model fuel cell electrocatalysts journal April 2002
Electrocatalysis of formic acid on palladium and platinum surfaces: from fundamental mechanisms to fuel cell applications journal January 2014
Carbon dioxide and formic acid—the couple for environmental-friendly hydrogen storage? journal January 2010
The interaction of formic acid with transition metal surfaces, studied in ultrahigh vacuum journal May 1994
Infrared spectroscopic study of methanol and formic acid absorbates on a platinum electrode: Part II. Role of the linear CO(a) derived from methanol and formic acid in the electrocatalytic oxidation of CH3OH and HCOOH journal February 1987
Mechanisms of formic acid, methanol, and carbon monoxide electrooxidation at platinum as examined by single potential alteration infrared spectroscopy journal February 1988
Bridge-Bonded Formate:  Active Intermediate or Spectator Species in Formic Acid Oxidation on a Pt Film Electrode? journal December 2006
Kinetics and Mechanism of the Electrooxidation of Formic Acid—Spectroelectrochemical Studies in a Flow Cell journal January 2006
The Role of Bridge-Bonded Adsorbed Formate in the Electrocatalytic Oxidation of Formic Acid on Platinum journal December 2010
Local and collective structure of formate on Pt(111) journal June 1993
Application of In-situ Attenuated Total Reflection-Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy for the Understanding of Complex Reaction Mechanism and Kinetics: Formic Acid Oxidation on a Pt Film Electrode at Elevated Temperatures journal May 2006
Adsorption of formic acid on clean and oxygen covered Pt(111) journal July 1982
Mechanism of the Water Gas Shift Reaction on Pt:  First Principles, Experiments, and Microkinetic Modeling journal March 2008
Oxidation of formic acid on the Pt(111) surface in the gas phase journal January 2010
Theoretical Elucidation of the Competitive Electro-oxidation Mechanisms of Formic Acid on Pt(111) journal December 2010
Mechanism of the Electrocatalytic Oxidation of Formic Acid on Metals journal March 2012
Formic Acid Oxidation at Pt/H 2 O Interface from Periodic DFT Calculations Integrated with a Continuum Solvation Model journal September 2009
A first principles comparison of the mechanism and site requirements for the electrocatalytic oxidation of methanol and formic acid over Pt journal January 2009
Theoretical Analysis of Transition-Metal Catalysts for Formic Acid Decomposition journal March 2014
Comparative theoretical study of formic acid decomposition on PtAg(111) and Pt(111) surfaces journal January 2015
New insight into the CO formation mechanism during formic acid oxidation on Pt(111) journal December 2012
Reexamination of formic acid decomposition on the Pt(111) surface both in the absence and in the presence of water, from periodic DFT calculations journal January 2015
Mechanistic Studies of Water–Gas-Shift Reaction on Transition Metals journal September 2011
E LECTRONIC S TRUCTURE AND C ATALYSIS ON M ETAL S URFACES journal October 2002
Special Points in the Brillouin Zone journal December 1973
Implementation of gradient-corrected exchange-correlation potentials in Car-Parrinello total-energy calculations journal August 1994
A new technique to calculate steepest descent paths in flexible polyatomic systems journal January 1990
Reversible work transition state theory: application to dissociative adsorption of hydrogen journal February 1995
A climbing image nudged elastic band method for finding saddle points and minimum energy paths journal December 2000
A first-principles study of surface and subsurface H on and in Ni(111): diffusional properties and coverage-dependent behavior journal August 2003
The temperature and coverage dependences of adsorbed formic acid and its conversion to formate on platinum(111) journal February 1992
Structure Sensitivity of Methanol Electrooxidation on Transition Metals journal October 2009
Trends in Formic Acid Decomposition on Model Transition Metal Surfaces: A Density Functional Theory study journal November 2014
Ni–Fe–S Cubanes in CO 2 Reduction Electrocatalysis: A DFT Study journal October 2013
Reaction channels for the catalytic oxidation of CO on Pt(111) journal August 1999
Energetics of Oxygen Adatoms, Hydroxyl Species and Water Dissociation on Pt(111) journal November 2012
Density Functional Theory Comparison of Water Dissociation Steps on Cu, Au, Ni, Pd, and Pt journal April 2009
Partial and complete reduction of O2 by hydrogen on transition metal surfaces journal September 2010
Catalytic Water Formation on Platinum:  A First-Principles Study journal May 2001

Cited By (9)

Van der Waals density functional study of formic acid adsorption and decomposition on Cu(111) journal April 2019
Electrochemical Hydroxylation of Arenes Catalyzed by a Keggin Polyoxometalate with a Cobalt(IV) Heteroatom journal April 2018
Structure Sensitivity of Formic Acid Electrooxidation on Transition Metal Surfaces: A First-Principles Study journal January 2018
DFT calculations on subnanometric metal catalysts: a short review on new supported materials journal March 2018
Escaping the trap of complication and complexity in multiscale microkinetic modelling of heterogeneous catalytic processes journal January 2017
Electrochemical Hydroxylation of Arenes Catalyzed by a Keggin Polyoxometalate with a Cobalt(IV) Heteroatom journal April 2018
Assessment of van der Waals inclusive density functional theory methods for adsorption and selective dehydrogenation of formic acid on Pt(111) surface journal January 2019
Competitive Transient Electrostatic Adsorption for In Situ Regeneration of Poisoned Catalyst journal February 2019
In Situ Exfoliation and Pt Deposition of Antimonene for Formic Acid Oxidation via a Predominant Dehydrogenation Pathway journal January 2020