Plasma-Assisted Synthesis of Methanol Through Hydrogenation of Carbon Dioxide With Non-Noble Metal Mixed Oxide Catalysts.

The utilization of carbon dioxide through chemical conversion is a promising approach for the recycling of carbon resources. Despite well-developed industrial processes for CO hydrogenation to methanol, the effective use of CO as a feedstock remains challenging because of the costly requirements of high temperature and reaction pressure. In this paper, we report the methanol synthesis from CO and hydrogen using a dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) reactor under atmospheric pressure with a nickel-cerium-aluminum mixed oxide (Ni/Ce-Al MOx) catalyst. The combined use of plasma and the Ni/Ce-Al MOx catalyst was observed to yield 13.3±0.4 % of methanol, favorably compared to the 2.6±0.5 % yield of the case without catalyst. Microscopy images, selected area electron diffraction patterns, and energy-dispersive X-ray analysis confirmed the presence of fluorite-structured ceria, aluminium, nickel, and nickel oxide particles in the catalyst. The reaction mechanism for the plasma-assisted hydrogenation of CO was hypothesized to involve a carbide formation pathway due to the presence of carbide confirmed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopic characterization.