Photoconversion of CO2 into methanol over ZnO photocatalyst

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Nanostructured Materials Lab., Advanced Material Department, CMRDI Cairo 11421, Egypt

2 Nanostructured Materials Lab., Advanced Material Department, CMRDI Cairo 11421, Egypt.

3 Faculty of Science, Department of Chemistry, Helwan University, Egypt.

Abstract

The dependence on fossil fuels for energy production has led to increasing carbon dioxide (CO2) gas concentration in the atmosphere from 280 ppm in the pre-industrial era to 406 ppm nowadays, causing the so-called global warming. Therefore, sustainable sources of energy are necessary to overcome this problem.  In this paper, we report the photoreduction of CO2 into hydrocarbons fuel over ZnO semiconductor. ZnO photocatalyst was prepared via modified thermal decomposition method where the X-ray diffraction pattern proved the fabrication of wurtzite hexagonal structure of ZnO nanoparticles. CO2 photoreduction was operated in CO2-saturated 0.5 M NaCl solution using 150 W mercury (Hg) lamp as the light source. Methanol and acetaldehyde were the main products in the experiment with the maximum production yield of 10.9 and 16 µmol/g respectively. The high photocatalytic activity would be related to the presence of Cl- ions, which acted as hole scavenger which decreased the rate of charge carriers recombination

Keywords

Mansoura Journal of Chemistry
Volume 43, Issue 1
February 2019
Pages 20-22

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