A novel nickel-based structured catalyst for CO2 methanation: A honeycomb-type Ni/CeO2 catalyst to transform greenhouse gas into useful resources

The purpose of this study is to construct a honeycomb-type structured catalyst with a high methanation performance to effectively transform CO2 to CH4. To select the best methanation component for structuring, a 10 wt% Ni-loaded granular catalyst was prepared by evaporation to dryness using Al2O3, TiO2, ZrO2, Y2O3, MgO and CeO2 as the support materials. The granular Ni/CeO2 catalyst displayed the highest activity at 200-500 degrees C, while the granular Ni/Al2O3, Ni/MgO and Ni/TiO2 catalysts showed low CO2 conversions. The variable affecting the Ni/CeO2 catalyst having a high performance would be related to the large amount of adsorbed CO2 and the production of many chemical species that originated from the CO2 on the surface. The structured catalyst with the Ni/CeO2 component was prepared by a wash-coating method on an aluminum substrate with a honeycomb-fin configuration. The prepared catalyst showed a high methanation performance, indicating that the cell density and the configuration of the honeycomb-fin clearly influenced the performance. Especially, the structured catalyst with the stacked-type-fin enhanced the methanation performance that improved the mass transfer properties in the reaction field. Furthermore, the structured Ni/CeO2 catalyst showed a steady catalytic performance that maintained the high activity and the high selectivity during a durability test at 350 degrees C. The honeycomb-type catalyst developed in this study has the potential to be a practicable catalyst for producing energy resources from CO2. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.