Sustainable Furfural Biomass Feedstocks Electrooxidation toward Value-Added Furoic Acid with Energy-Saving H₂ Fuel Production Using Pt-Decorated Co₃O₄ Nanospheres

Here, furfural oxidation was performed to replace the kinetically sluggish O₂ evolution reaction (OER). Pt-Co₃O₄ nanospheres were developed via pulsed laser ablation in liquid (PLAL) in a single step for the paired electrocatalysis of an H₂ evolution reaction (HER) and furfural oxidation reaction (FOR). The FOR afforded a high furfural conversion (44.2%) with a major product of 2-furoic acid after a 2-h electrolysis at 1.55 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode in a 1.0-M KOH/50-mM furfural electrolyte. The Pt-Co₃O₄ electrode exhibited a small overpotential of 290 mV at 10 mA cm⁻². As an anode and cathode in an electrolyzer system, the Pt-Co₃O₄ electrocatalyst required only a small applied cell voltage of ~1.83 V to deliver 10 mA cm⁻², compared with that of the pure water electrolyzer (OER||HER, ~1.99 V). This study simultaneously realized the integrated production of energy-saving H₂ fuel at the cathode and 2-furoic acid at the anode.