Effect of CO Adsorption and Coverage on Ethanol Production from Syngas

With the growing interest in developing new technologies for alternative energy resources ethanol has gained prominence as it can be used both as alternative fuel and fuel additive. Most of the Worlds ethanol produced today comes from Biomass. The biomass feedstocks and fermentation broths used in ethanol production both contain high amounts of water and therefore, the energy efficiency of the process is lessened by product separation processes (azeotropic CO can adsorb on metal surface binding with one (atop), two (bridge) and three (hollow) metal atoms. All three possibilities were considered. Number of CO molecules on the surface is increased systematically from one to six and the adsorption energies are Calculated. Infrared spectra can be used to determine the binding strength and the site of bindin