Thermo-photo catalytic CO2 hydrogenation over Ru/TiO2

It is attractive to convert CO2 greenhouse gas into valuable compounds via photocatalysis with solar energy. One of important processes is the photocatalytic hydrogenation of CO2. However, its current process still suffers from insufficiency. Herein, thermal energy was introduced to increase the driving force for photocatalysis, leading to efficient thermo-photo catalytic reduction of CO2 over 1 wt% Ru/TiO2 catalyst in a fixed bed reactor. Even at a low temperature of 150 oC and 1 atm, a high yield of CH4 (1.72 mmolgcat−1h−1) under weak sunlight (1 Sun) irradiation was achieved, whereas no CH4 was detected without light irradiation. It is two orders of magnitude larger than most reported result, and two times of the recent reported maximum value under strong sunlight (14.5 Suns) irradiation. Furthermore, CH4 yield increased to 69.49 mmolgcat−1h−1 at 300 oC, which is 3 times larger than that without light illumination.It is attractive to convert CO2 greenhouse gas into valuable compounds via photocatalysis with solar energy. One of important processes is the photocatalytic hydrogenation of CO2. However, its current process still suffers from insufficiency. Herein, thermal energy was introduced to increase the driving force for photocatalysis, leading to efficient thermo-photo catalytic reduction of CO2 over 1 wt% Ru/TiO2 catalyst in a fixed bed reactor. Even at a low temperature of 150 oC and 1 atm, a high yield of CH4 (1.72 mmolgcat−1h−1) under weak sunlight (1 Sun) irradiation was achieved, whereas no CH4 was detected without light irradiation. It is two orders of magnitude larger than most reported result, and two times of the recent reported maximum value under strong sunlight (14.5 Suns) irradiation. Furthermore, CH4 yield increased to 69.49 mmolgcat−1h−1 at 300 oC, which is 3 times larger than that without light illumination.