Isolated and H2-reduced Anderson clusters catalyse low-temperature hydrogenation of CO2 to methanol
摘要
CO2 hydrogenation, especially to methanol, is crucial to establishing sustainable closed-loop systems for carbon utilization. However, the difficulties of CO2 activation at low temperatures and the ambiguity of structure–activity correlations are obstacles to reducing the energy consumption of the hydrogenation process. Here we report that molecularly defined Anderson PtMo6O24 clusters, sited within a robust metal–organic framework, are catalytic for low-temperature CO2 hydrogenation. The performance of the cluster showed no signs of decay in either its activity or methanol selectivity over 3,600 h at 180 °C. It also achieves a per-pass yield exceeding that of state-of-the-art heterogeneous catalysts under similar conditions. Combined in situ spectroscopy and density functional theory calculations demonstrated that CH3OH formation is dominated by the reverse water–gas shift and subsequent CO* hydrogenation pathway, while the HCOO* pathway may serve as a supplementary route. The well-defined cluster structure offers an ideal model for elucidating structure–activity correlations and opens exciting avenues for the rational design of high-activity, low-temperature catalysts for CO2 hydrogenation.