A New Energy-Saving Catalytic System: Carbon Dioxide Activation by a Metal/Carbon Catalyst

The conversion of CO₂ into useful chemicals is an attractive method to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to produce sustainable chemicals. However, the thermodynamic stability of CO₂ means that a lot of energy is required for its conversion into chemicals. Here, we suggest a new catalytic system with an alternative heating system that allows minimal energy consumption during CO₂ conversion. In this system, electrical energy is transferred as heat energy to the carbon-supported metal catalyst. Fast ramping rates allow high operating temperatures (T_app=250 °C) to be reached within 5 min, which leads to an 80-fold decrease of energy consumption in methane reforming using CO₂ (DRM). In addition, the consumed energy normalized by time during the DRM reaction in this current-assisted catalysis is sixfold lower (11.0 kJ min⁻¹) than that in conventional heating systems (68.4 kJ min⁻¹).