Conversion of CO2 to useful substances with composite iron, nickel, and copper catalysts

Abstract

Composite materials of Fe/Al2O3, which consist of small particles of iron supported by thermally stable alumina even at 500–700 °C, have been widely used in the water-gas shift reaction for natural gas reforming. Therefore, Fe/Al2O3 is one of the promising candidates for re-transformation of exhausted CO2 into fuels such as alcohols and hydrocarbons. The development of a CO2 reforming system using the composite materials of Fe/Al2O3 through CO2 reduction to CO, dissociation of water into hydrogen, and methanol synthesis has been investigated. It was found that dry and steam (i.e. wet) reforming of CO2 produced almost the same amount of CO. At a temperature above 500 °C, maximal and saturated yields of CO and H2 from CO2 and water were obtained. However, this CO2 reforming system requires higher-pressure conditions from several tens to hundreds standard atmospheric pressure in order to achieve high yield and selectivity for methanol production. In this study we developed the modified CO2 reforming system by the utilization of Ni and/or Cu instead of Fe in order to obtain other types of useful products such as CO, CH4, and carbon, more efficiently and selectively under atmospheric pressure. When Ni or Cu was used, conversion of CO2 was reduced to 76%, while 9% of methane was detected in the case of Ni. On the other hand, though the CO2 conversion reduced half of the Fe, the selectivity of CO from CO2 increased to 95% in the case of Cu.