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. 2017 May 2:8:15174.
doi: 10.1038/ncomms15174.

Directly converting CO2 into a gasoline fuel

Jian Wei  1   2 , Qingjie Ge  1 , Ruwei Yao  1   2 , Zhiyong Wen  1   2 , Chuanyan Fang  1 , Lisheng Guo  1   2 , Hengyong Xu  1 , Jian Sun  1
Affiliations

Directly converting CO2 into a gasoline fuel

Jian Wei et al. Nat Commun. .

Erratum in

Abstract

The direct production of liquid fuels from CO2 hydrogenation has attracted enormous interest for its significant roles in mitigating CO2 emissions and reducing dependence on petrochemicals. Here we report a highly efficient, stable and multifunctional Na-Fe3O4/HZSM-5 catalyst, which can directly convert CO2 to gasoline-range (C5-C11) hydrocarbons with selectivity up to 78% of all hydrocarbons while only 4% methane at a CO2 conversion of 22% under industrial relevant conditions. It is achieved by a multifunctional catalyst providing three types of active sites (Fe3O4, Fe5C2 and acid sites), which cooperatively catalyse a tandem reaction. More significantly, the appropriate proximity of three types of active sites plays a crucial role in the successive and synergetic catalytic conversion of CO2 to gasoline. The multifunctional catalyst, exhibiting a remarkable stability for 1,000 h on stream, definitely has the potential to be a promising industrial catalyst for CO2 utilization to liquid fuels.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Catalytic performance for CO2 hydrogenation.
(a) CO2 conversion and product selectivity over different Na–Fe3O4/Zeolite catalysts; reaction conditions: H2/CO2=3,320 °C, 3 MPa and 4,000 ml h−1 gcat−1. (b) CO2 conversion and product selectivity at different H2/CO2 ratios over Na–Fe3O4/HZSM-5(160) catalyst at 320 °C, 3 MPa and 4,000 ml h−1 gcat−1. (c,d) The detailed hydrocarbon product distribution obtained over Na–Fe3O4 (c) and Na–Fe3O4/HZSM-5(160) (d) catalysts, an additional ASF plot and α value comparison of above two catalysts are also depicted; Wn is the weight fraction of a product with n carbon atoms.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Structural characterization of Na–Fe3O4 catalyst.
(a,c) TEM images of fresh (a) and spent (c) Na–Fe3O4 catalyst. Scale bar, 100 nm. (b,d) HRTEM images of fresh (b) and spent (d) Na–Fe3O4 catalyst. Scale bar, 10 nm. (e) XRD patterns of fresh and spent Na–Fe3O4 catalyst. (f) Mössbauer spectra of spent Na–Fe3O4 catalyst.
Figure 3
Figure 3. Reaction scheme for CO2 hydrogenation to gasoline-range hydrocarbons.
The CO2 hydrogenation reaction over Na–Fe3O4/Zeolite multifunctional catalyst takes place in three steps: (1) an initially reduced to CO intermediate via RWGS, (2) a subsequent hydrogenation of CO to α-olefins intermediate via FTS and (3) the formation of gasoline-range hydrocarbons via the acid-catalysed oligomerization, isomerization and aromatization reactions.
Figure 4
Figure 4. CO2 hydrogenation performance over the multifunctional catalysts with different proximity.
(a) CO2 conversion and product selectivity over different combinations of Na–Fe3O4 and HZSM-5 catalysts conducted at the same reaction conditions as Fig. 1a; HCs: hydrocarbons. (b) The composition of gasoline-range hydrocarbons on different Na–Fe3O4/HZSM-5(160) composite catalysts. (c) The stability of the Na–Fe3O4/HZSM-5 catalyst with dual-bed configuration under the same reaction conditions as Fig. 1a. The hydrocarbon selectivities are normalized with the exception of CO.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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