As mentioned above, even in near neutral medium, carbonate forms from the reaction between CO2 and OH -near the cathode, crosses the electrolyte solution, and is protonated near the anode to regenerate CO2 (fig. ). For CO2 reduction to CO, 50% of CO2 consumption is captured by the electrolyte to form carbonate. Seger et al. experimentally showed that only 30% of CO2 consumption was involved in CO2 reduction when Cu catalyst was used to form deepreduction products. In our steady state electrolysis in near neutral medium, the amount of CO2 in the gas mixture generated at the anode compartment was higher than that of O2 (fig. ).