Carbon dioxide is an unused carbon source, often a side product of fossil fuel use and other industrial processes. Carbon dioxide is thermodynamically stable and inert molecule, often released into the atmosphere and a greenhouse gas which negatively impacts on the environment. The use of catalysts would help the conversion of carbon dioxide into high value chemicals to help reduce the need of fossil fuel use. With the help of parallel reactors, catalyst and a mixture of carbon dioxide and hydrogen I successfully obtained alcohols and other high value chemicals. I synthesized the catalysts based on copper oxide, zinc oxide and iron oxides. The main goal was to synthesize a catalyst with the highest conversion of carbon dioxide into ethanol. The products were analyzed with gas chromatography. I tested the catalysts based on zeolite support and metal oxides, doped with various weight percentages of caesium or rubidium to increase the selectivity of carbon dioxide conversion into ethanol. I also characterized successful catalysts using SEM, EDS, XRD, BET and ICP–OES methods.
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