Using carbon dioxide emitted from coal-based power plants as the raw material for producing methanol could give a green hue to methanol production. Current CO2-to-methanol processes, however, require high pressures, which necessitates large quantities of energy and has high costs.
A new catalyst developed at Argonne National Laboratory lowers the energy needed for the conversion of CO2 to methanol. Consisting of clusters of four copper atoms attached to a film of aluminum oxide, the catalyst allows the hydrogenation of CO2 at much lower pressures — CO2 partial pressure of 0.013 atm, compared with 0.25 atm for conventional catalysts.
Methanol production is typically carried out in two steps. First, natural gas (or other feedstock) is converted to synthesis gas (a mixture of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen) via gasification. Then, the syngas is converted to methanol in a highpressure, low-temperature process over a copper/zinc-oxide/aluminumoxide (Cu/ZnO/Al2O3) catalyst.
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