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Analytical Chemistry * * * --------------------------------------------------------------------- June 24, 2025 The GIST Two-step system makes plastic from carbon dioxide, water and electricity by Kimm Fesenmaier, California Institute of Technology edited by Stephanie Baum, reviewed by Robert Egan [stephanie] Stephanie Baum scientific editor Meet our editorial team Behind our editorial process [Robert] Robert Egan associate editor Meet our editorial team Behind our editorial process Editors' notes This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: fact-checked peer-reviewed publication trusted source proofread Making plastic from carbon dioxide, water, and electricity Credit: Angewandte Chemie International Edition (2025). DOI: 10.1002/ anie.202503003 What if a machine could suck up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, run it through a series of chemical reactions, and essentially spit out industrially useful plastic? "I think that is something that we, as a society, would be interested in. After all, in addition to being a greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide is an abundant and inexpensive feedstock," says Theo Agapie, Ph.D., the John Stauffer Professor of Chemistry and the executive officer for chemistry at Caltech. "With our new work, we have taken a significant step in that direction." Reporting in the journal Angewandte Chemie International Edition, Agapie and a team of Caltech chemists have developed a system that uses electricity from sustainable sources to carry out the chemical conversion of carbon dioxide (CO[2]) into molecules, such as ethylene and carbon monoxide, that are useful for making more complex compounds. When this is accomplished using light as the energy source, without plants, such a process is known as artificial photosynthesis. The new system feeds the ethylene and carbon monoxide that have been generated into a second catalytic loop that yields industrially useful plastics called polyketones, which are known for their strength, durability, and thermal stability, making them ideal for applications ranging from adhesives to car parts and from sports equipment to industrial piping. "We have shown that one can use CO[2] to make a material that is useful, without using plants as a mediator," says lead author Max Zhelyabovskiy, a graduate student in Agapie's lab who was co-mentored on the project by Jonas C. Peters, Caltech's Bren Professor of Chemistry and director of the Resnick Sustainability Institute. [INS::INS] The Caltech-led team is not the first to build a system that attempts to pair CO[2] reduction with a second chemical reaction to ultimately produce polymers. But previous systems have added ethylene that comes from petroleum products, rather than deriving it from carbon dioxide and water. The conversion of CO[2] all the way to plastic has been challenging for a number of reasons. Among those is the fact that previous electrochemical CO[2] reduction systems have yielded very little ethylene and carbon monoxide, the reagents needed to feed the second step of the conversion to polyketones. In fact, most have produced less than 5% concentrations of these desired compounds, along with other undesired chemicals that can potentially harm downstream processes. "It has been difficult, at least on the lab scale, to obtain high-concentration, high-purity streams of reagents that can then be converted into something like a plastic or a fuel," Zhelyabovskiy says. But the system he helped develop achieves significantly higher concentrations--11% ethylene and 14% carbon monoxide. But that is not the only challenge. Coupling the two systems--one for the CO[2] reduction and another for the catalysis step that follows--is not trivial, says Zhelyabovskiy: "Most work in the literature focuses on either the first or the second step, separately and with pure feedstocks. Not both." Discover the latest in science, tech, and space with over 100,000 subscribers who rely on Phys.org for daily insights. Sign up for our free newsletter and get updates on breakthroughs, innovations, and research that matter--daily or weekly. [ ] Subscribe A two-step system Recognizing the vastly different environments needed for the CO[2] reduction and the secondary catalytic step to operate with high efficiency, the Caltech team devised a system featuring two distinct loops for the separate reactions. For the first loop, the system begins with gas diffusion electrode cells, hydrophobic polymers coated in a thin layer of copper. The scientists pump CO[2] into a gas cylinder connected to the cells and flow a potassium bicarbonate electrolyte through the cells, all while applying a voltage to the electrodes. By looping the gases through this electrochemical setup multiple times, they are able to generate relatively high concentrations of ethylene and carbon monoxide. After about an hour of building up those gases, the researchers then feed the ethylene and carbon monoxide into the second step: a closed reactor where the gases are bubbled through a solution of a palladium catalyst. Like a bubbler in a fish tank, this process enriches the solution of ethylene and carbon monoxide. And the catalyst, which is known as a co-polymerization catalyst, drives the efficient formation of a polymer--in this case, a polyketone--from the two monomers. A catalyst that does its job under working conditions Typically, catalysts are tested under pristine conditions that do not necessarily represent the environments they are exposed to during electrochemical CO[2] reduction. For example, although water vapor is very harmful to many polymerization catalysts, water is a necessary part of CO[2] reduction, and thus the introduction of water vapor is inevitable. [INS::INS] In the new work, Agapie, Peters and their colleagues have shown that the palladium catalyst can be used even in the presence of contaminants that are introduced during CO[2] reduction--including not only water vapor but also hydrogen, unreacted CO[2], alcohol vapors, and other chemical intermediates. Zhelyabovskiy says that the new system and technique needs additional refinement. It does not yet produce polyketones with the same molecular weights as those made the standard way, for example. However, he says, "by demonstrating that it's possible, we might increase the amount of interest in this field, and maybe people can build upon this principle." Agapie notes that for this process to lead to a sustainable and practical technology, electricity has to come from renewable and carbon-neutral sources, and it has to be sufficiently inexpensive to compete with petroleum sources. Additional authors of the paper, "Plastic from CO[2], Water, and Electricity: Tandem Electrochemical CO[2] Reduction and Thermochemical Ethylene-CO Copolymerization," are Hyuk-Joon Jung and Paula L. Diaconescu of UCLA. More information: Maxim Zhelyabovskiy et al, Plastic from CO[2], Water, and Electricity: Tandem Electrochemical CO[2] Reduction and Thermochemical Ethylene-CO Copolymerization, Angewandte Chemie International Edition (2025). DOI: 10.1002/anie.202503003 Journal information: Angewandte Chemie International Edition Provided by California Institute of Technology Citation: Two-step system makes plastic from carbon dioxide, water and electricity (2025, June 24) retrieved 13 July 2025 from https:// phys.org/news/2025-06-plastic-carbon-dioxide-electricity.html This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. 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The process offers a potential route to sustainable plastic production if powered by renewable energy. This summary was automatically generated using LLM. Full disclaimer Let us know if there is a problem with our content Use this form if you have come across a typo, inaccuracy or would like to send an edit request for the content on this page. For general inquiries, please use our contact form. For general feedback, use the public comments section below (please adhere to guidelines). Please select the most appropriate category to facilitate processing of your request [-- please select one -- ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] Your message to the editors [ ] Your email (optional, only if you'd like a response) [ ] Send Feedback Thank you for taking time to provide your feedback to the editors. Your feedback is important to us. However, we do not guarantee individual replies due to the high volume of messages. 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