Flame-made Cu/ZrO2 catalysts with metastable phase and strengthened interactions for CO2 hydrogenation to methanol

Facile synthesis of a highly efficient Cu/ZrO2 catalyst by a flame spray pyrolysis (FSP) method was developed for methanol production from CO2 hydrogenation. The instantaneous quenching process from extremely high temperature in FSP was used for rational design of a Cu/ZrO2 catalyst, not only producing the metastable tetragonal phase ZrO2, but also strengthening the metal-support interaction. The methanol yield of one-step synthesized FSP-Cu/ZrO2 was 3 times higher than the one made by the traditional method. This strategy is anticipated to pave the way for strengthening metal-support interactions of supported catalysts.