Copper-based catalysts turn carbon dioxide into methane

According to the study published in Advanced Materials, the method relies on electrolysis and catalysts developed by grafting isolated copper atoms on two-dimensional polymer templates.

“Electricity-driven carbon dioxide conversion can produce a large array of industrial fuels and feedstocks via different pathways,” said Soumyabrata Roy, a research scientist in the lab of Rice University materials scientist Pulickel Ajayan and the study’s lead author. “However, carbon dioxide-to-methane conversion involves an eight-step pathway that raises significant challenges for selective and energy-efficient methane production.

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“Overcoming such issues can help close the artificial carbon cycle at meaningful scales, and the development of efficient and affordable catalysts is a key step toward achieving this goal.”

The polymer templates, which were made of alternating carbon and nitrogen atoms, have pores where copper atoms can fit at varying distances from one another. The catalysts assemble at room temperature in water with the copper atoms displacing the host metal ions in the polymer templates.