Formerly greatly feared in mining and also a possible cause of flue gas poisoning in house fires, carbon monoxide (CO) is actually an important and indispensable raw material for the chemical industry. For example, it is used in combination with hydrogen as a synthesis gas or as a raw material for the production of some carbonyl compounds.

However, CO has so far mostly been produced from fossil raw materials, which harms the climate. In the first and second phases of the Kopernikus project P2X, researchers successfully developed and scaled up a CO2-to-CO electrolyser. Using sustainable electricity and CO2 from sustainable sources, this enables the production of green CO.

CO2-to-CO electrolysis thus contributes as an important technology to the defossilisation of the chemical industry. Furthermore, it enables a resilient supply of industry without relying on fossil sources. As a satellite project, the P2ValueChemicals consortium complements the Kopernikus project P2X in phase three and aims to research and validate the previously developed CO2-to-CO electrolyser in continuous operation in various operating modes. The project partners want to demonstrate the use of the generated CO in an industrially relevant process under application-relevant conditions.