Development of an effective bi-functional Ni-CaO catalyst-sorbent for the sorption-enhanced water gas shift reaction through structural optimization and the controlled deposition of a stabilizer by atomic layer deposition

The integration of a CaO-based CO2 sorbent into catalytic schemes to remove CO2 from the product stream provides an effective means to reduce greenhouse gas emissions of chemical processes and to improve the yield and purity of the desired product. A key requirement for such so-called sorbent-enhanced processes is the availability of cyclically stable CO2 sorbent. To this end, we have developed CaO-based CO2 sorbents that combine favourable structural features and a high thermal stability by introducing a thin, conformal layer of Al2O3 (forming Ca3Al2O6 with CaO upon calcination) by atomic layer deposition. The structure and pore volume of the sorbent were found to play a key role in its CO2 capture. Functionalizing such CO2 sorbents with Ni nanoparticles yielded a highly effective bi-functional material for the sorption-enhanced water-gas shift (SE-WGS) reaction. The material showed a high yield of hydrogen of high purity and minimal CO slip over several cycles of repeated SE-WGS/regeneration operation.