DESIGN OF CATALYST FOR PHOTOCATALYTIC REDUCTION OF CO2

11th International Multidisciplinary Scientific GeoConference SGEM2011, www.sgem.org, SGEM2011 Conference Proceedings/ ISSN 1314-2704, June 20-25, 2011, Vol. 2, 1201-1206 pp

ABSTRACT

The large-scale emission of carbon dioxide in to the atmosphere has wrought of the
most serious and dangerous problems upon the earth, especially with regard to the
devastating consequences of the greenhouse effect. The reduction and/or fixation of
carbon dioxide can be said to be one of the most important areas of research in
chemistry today, not only for solving the many urgent problems resulting from the
pollution of the global environment but also for finding ways to maintain vital carbon
resources.

One of the best catalysts for photocatalytic reduction of CO2 + H2O to CH4 and CH3OH
is TiO2. If some amount of metals (Ru, Rh, Cr, Co, Cu, Ni, Pt and Pd) is supported on
TiO2, the selectivity will change.

In the photocatalytic Reduction of CO2 with H2O, with addition some of Co, the dcharacter
of the supported metal on TiO2 is decreased and the Fermi-level of the catalyst
is raised, therefore production of methanol will increase.

Keywords: Reduction of CO2, Photocatalyst, Fermi level, TiO2, methanol synthesis