Recent advances of CO2 hydrogenation to methanol

Abstract

The increasingly serious climate issue compels urgent greenhouse gas mitigation strategies. As a budget, plentiful, renewable feedstock and major contributor to global warming, the large-scale catalytic transformation of CO₂ has attracted widespread attention from society due to its potential as a solution to the environment and energy crises. At present, catalytic hydrogenation of carbon dioxide to organic chemicals is the primary approach in its industrial applications. In recent decades, various materials containing Cu-, precious metal-, In-, Zn-, and Ga-based catalysts have been designed for CO₂ hydrogenation to methanol. Likewise, great advances have been made in CO₂-to-chemicals, such as olefins, aromatics, and gasoline by combining CO₂-to-CH₃OH with methanol transformation or tandem reaction of reverse water-gas shift and Fischer-Tropsch (FT) synthesis. This review exhibits the recent advances in the hydrogenation of CO₂-to-CH₃OH including the catalyst system, CO₂ activation, nature of active sites, intermediate species (formate or carboxyl), structure-activity relationship, and reaction mechanism. Finally, challenges and outlooks in CO₂ hydrogenation to methanol are summarized.