A Review of Iron and Cobalt Porphyrins, Phthalocyanines, and Related Complexes for Electrochemical and Photochemical Reduction of Carbon Dioxide

This review summarizes research on the electrochemical and photochemical reduction of CO2 using a variety of iron and cobalt porphyrins, phthalocyanines, and related complexes. Metalloporphyrins and metallophthalocyanines are visible light absorbers with extremely large extinction coefficients. However, yields of photochemically-generated active catalysts for CO2 reduction are typically low owing to the requirement of a second photoinduced electron. This requirement is not relevant to the case of electrochemical CO2 reduction. Recent progress on efficient and stable electrochemical systems includes the use of FeTPP catalysts that have prepositioned phenyl OH groups in their second coordination spheres. This has led to remarkable progress in carrying out coupled proton-electron transfer reactions for CO2 reduction. Such ground-breaking research has to be continued in order to produce renewable fuels in an economically feasible manner.