Scalable Conversion of CO₂ to N-Doped Carbon Foam for Efficient Oxygen Reduction Reaction and Lithium Storage

With regard to CO₂ usage for the sustainable production of value-added chemicals, this work provides a fast pyrolysis process for the first time that can be scaled up in directly capturing CO₂ to produce N-doped carbon foam (NCF) as a functional nanomaterial. Flammable alkaline solutions of hydrazine hydrate serves as CO₂ adsorbent, fuel as well as nitrogen source for the NCFs, and magnesium powders are involved into the reaction to provide complex metal ion and also energy for the self-propagating high-temperature combustion pyrolysis. The prepared NCFs exhibit efficient electrochemistry performance toward lithium-ion battery and oxygen reduction reaction benefiting from the well-formed foam structure with hierarchical pores, in situ nitrogen doping and high specific surface area. More importantly, this approach introduce a general solution system that can further integrate various additives dissolved homogeneously, thus greatly increasing process controllability and product selectivity for the thermochemical conversion of CO₂.