Photocatalytic reduction of carbon dioxide and methane to light hydrocarbons over nitrogen doped titanium dioxide

Abstract

Concerns of fossil fuel reserves depletion and environmental pollution problems have led to increased demand for alternative fuels. Therefore, methods for converting natural gas into useful fuels were considered. The main objective of this study is to develop pathways for photolysis reduction of carbon dioxide and methane. Initially nanocatalyst were investigated using cell type photoreactor with C2H6 and C3H8 as main products during CO2 reduction with CH4 over nitrogen (N) /TiO2 nanocatalyst. The yield of C2H6 over TiO2 was 35 μmole g-1 catal-1 enhanced to 166 μmole g-1 catal-1 using 15% N doped TiO2. Besides, the effects of parameters such as, CH4/CO2 feed ratio, reaction temperature and light irradiation time on yield of reduction of CO2 was studied. Finally, the central composite design (CCD) was employed to find individual and interactive effects of the mentioned parameter on yields of C2H6 was studied. The predicted values of the yield of C2H6 were found to be in good agreement with experimental values (R2= 0.97), which indicate the suitability of the CCD model.