Improvement in the activity of Ni/In2O3 with the addition of ZrO2 for CO2 hydrogenation to methanol

Abstract

Ni/In2O3 was confirmed to be active for CO2 hydrogenation to methanol. Herein, the In2O3-ZrO2 solid solution was prepared to support the highly dispersed nickel catalyst by chemical reduction. A CO2 conversion of 17.9% with a space-time yield (STY) of methanol of 0.63 gMeOH gcat−1 h−1 was achieved at 300 °C and 5 MPa on Ni/In2O3-ZrO2 of 5 wt% Ni loading. The STY of methanol has a 43.2% increase, compared to Ni/In2O3. The use of ZrO2 optimizes the oxygen vacancies for CO2 activation. The highly dispersed Ni catalyst facilitates hydrogen spillover, which improves hydrogenation ability and the formation of oxygen vacancies.