Industrial basalt fiber-loaded CuNi for the continuous synthesis of DMC from CO2 and methanol

Developing efficient catalysts is crucial for the chemical utilization of CO2, which would be conducive to solving both environmental issues and the resource crisis. In this work, a basalt fiber (BF)-supported CuNi catalyst was constructed for the conversion of CO2 and methanol to dimethyl carbonate (DMC). In order to optimize the surface properties of BF, the pristine BF (BF-U) was modified by HCl (BF-H) and NaOH (BF-N) solutions. The influence of the BF surface properties on the physicochemical state of CuNi and the catalytic performance of the supported CuNi/BF catalysts was systematically investigated. The results showed that the CuNi/BF-N monolithic catalyst had the best activity, and the yield of DMC reached 12.9%. SEM, XRD, and XPS characterizations exhibited that the CuNi nanoalloy particles were uniformly distributed on BF-N and possessed high Cu0/1+ and Ni0 contents. This contributed to the abundant CO2 adsorption sites, as evidenced by CO2-TPD, especially for the medium-strength CO2 adsorption sites, which was responsible for the superior catalytic activity. This study provides an efficient catalyst for the synthesis of DMC from CO2 and methanol and can serve as a reference for industrial catalyst design.