Facile Electron Transfer to CO₂ during Adsorption at the Metal | Solution Interface

Abstract

We estimate the rate of electron transfer to CO₂ at the Au (211)|water interface during adsorption in an electrochemical environment under reducing potentials. On the basis of density functional theory calculations at the generalized gradient approximation and hybrid levels of theory, we find electron transfer to the adsorbed *CO₂ to be very facile. This high rate of transfer is estimated by the energy distribution of the adsorbate-induced density of states as well as from the interaction between diabatic states representing neutral and negatively charged CO₂. Up to 0.62 electrons is transferred to CO₂, and this charge adiabatically increases with the bending angle to a lower limit of 137°. We conclude that this rate of electron transfer is extremely fast compared to the time scale of the nuclear degrees of freedom, that is, the adsorption process.