Turning greenhouse gas into gasoline
A new catalyst material developed by chemists at MIT provides key insight into the design requirements for producing liquid fuels from carbon dioxide, the leading component of greenhouse gas emissions. The findings suggest a route toward using the world’s existing infrastructure for fuel storage and distribution, without adding net greenhouse emissions to the atmosphere. The new catalyst takes the process only through its first stage — converting carbon dioxide (CO2) to carbon monoxide (CO), explains assistant professor of chemistry Yogesh Surendranath, the senior researcher on a new study describing the advance. But that’s a key initial step toward converting CO2 to other chemicals including fuels, he says; there are already established methods for converting CO and hydrogen to a variety of liquid fuels and other products. The study appears this week in the international chemistry journal Angewandte Chemie. Its authors are Youngmin Yoon, a graduate student at MIT; Anthony Shoji Hall, a...