Current developments in CO2 hydrogenation towards methanol: A review related to industrial application

Regarding the still increasing CO2 emissions and the accompanied imminent climate change, utilization of CO2-containing exhaust gases is one of the major opportunities to lower CO2 emissions while obtaining valuable products in parallel. Methanol as one of today's key platform chemicals can be industrially produced from these exhaust gases by heterogeneously catalyzed CO2 hydrogenation. This review elaborates why the Cu/ZnO/Al2O3 catalyst is still the most promising candidate to catalyze CO2 hydrogenation from exhaust gases to reduce CO2 emissions in the short term. It emphasizes catalyst lifetime and deactivation as well as catalyst poisoning, which are significant factors considering the use of impurity-containing exhaust gases. Besides modifications of the Cu/ZnO system, completely different catalysts are discussed regarding their usability and comparability to the conventional Cu/ZnO/Al2O3 catalyst.