A review on the development of catalysts and technologies of CO2 hydrogenation to produce methanol

The heterogeneous catalysis of CO2 and H2 to CH3OH is a crucial technology for mitigating CO2 emissions and its promising application prospects have been driving extensive research. In this review, a wide variety of catalysts including copper, precious metal, typical metal oxides, and common metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are systematically summarized. The corresponding reaction mechanisms are described. The status and prospect of industrial development in this field are discussed. Although the industrial scale of copper-based catalysts has been realized, the single-pass conversion rate is low and they are easy to deactivate. Intensive work is devoted to solving these problems by developing new catalysts. The excellent stability of more than 3000 hours and excellent low-temperature performances make MoS2 a promising catalyst. Much understanding has been obtained in various catalysts, though the mechanisms are ambiguous and molecular insights are still desperately needed. In the future, developing new efficient catalysts under low temperature with high stability is still the main concern in CO2 conversion system.