Utilization of CO2 for aromatics production over ZnO/ZrO2-ZSM-5 tandem catalyst

In the past decades, considerable achievements have been made in CO2 hydrogenation to various C1 chemicals, lower olefins, and gasoline. However, the synthesis of aromatics from one-pass CO2 hydrogenation is still a great challenge owing to the extreme inertness of CO2 and the high aromatization barrier. Here we present a tandem catalyst comprising of ZnO/ZrO2 and ZSM-5 zeolite for one-pass CO2 conversion to aromatics with a selectivity of 70%, and the selectivity of undesirable methane is greatly suppressed to lower than 1%. A pathway of CO2 -> CH3OH -> aromatics over the tandem catalyst was demonstrated. This work offers a viable alternative for CO2 emission abatement through its valorization as a low or even negative-cost feedstock.