Due to the promise of electrochemical CO2 reduction technology, and a lack of selective and efficient cathode materials, a large fraction of the field has undergone a global, multidisciplinary effort over the last decade to find new and better catalysts. The search is complicated by the large number of surface factors impacting activity including intermediate binding energy, (via coordination and site availability ), packing, kinetic supply of reactants, desorption of products, adsorbate-adsorbate interactions, etc. The urgency of these efforts is illustrated by the large number of material-centric review papers published in the last year alone on catalyst development/optimization. Here, we define the catalyst as the surface on which CO2 is reduced. As with any catalytic process, however, the local and system reaction environments play equally important roles in efficiently driving specific reactions, while suppressing unwanted competing ones. Many researchers have reported the extreme sensitivity of the reaction to changes in local pH, electrolytes and cations (easily illustrated by replacing K + with Na + ). The 'catalyst' that notably reduces the energy barrier for CO2 reduction processes is then very much a combined material and environmental effect, rather than that of the catalyst's surface (composition, coordination, nano/mesostructure) alone.