CO2 Conversion by Reverse Water Gas Shift Reaction

In recent decades, the world has been concerned about the environmental impact of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. Thus,researchers have been focusing on enhancing current technologies, such as the Reverse Water Gas Shift (RWGS) reaction, to convert CO2 to synthetic fuels. The goal of this research was to develop a catalyst that has a high CO2 conversion and CO selectivity. To achieve this goal, different experiments were conducted at the same conditions to study the effect of different supports, metal loadings and different metals. All the experimental results were compared to equilibrium data obtained from Aspen Plus. Each tested catalyst was analyzed by BET and XRD to understand its physical and chemical structure as well as its behavior. Best catalyst was identified to be 5 wt% Cu supported on MgO, which achieved 20% CO2 conversion, 84% of Equilibrium CO2 conversion, and 75% CO selectivity