Research/Environment/CO₂ capture & conversion

CO₂ capture & conversion

Selective capture of CO₂ and its catalytic transformation into value-added products.

6 researchers

CO₂ capture and catalytic conversion

Global decarbonisation requires both capturing CO₂ from flue gas or the atmosphere and transforming it into fuels or platform chemicals. MOFs sit at the heart of both steps.

Capture

  • Post-combustion separation: amine-grafted MIL-101(Cr) achieving >95% CO₂ purity and 2.1 GJ/t regeneration heat — the lowest reported for a sorbent-based process (our ESPCI pilot, 2026)
  • Direct air capture (DAC): flexible MOFs with breathing behaviour that desorb at 60 °C, enabling solar-driven regeneration

Conversion

  • CO₂-to-methanol: Cu/Zn nodes in MOF-derived catalysts outperform commercial Cu/ZnO/Al₂O₃ by 40% in space-time yield
  • Photocatalytic reduction: Ti-MOFs under visible light convert CO₂ to CO and formate with quantum yields of 12%

Scale-up

Our rooftop pilot at ESPCI (5 L column, 100 kg CO₂/year) is a test bed for validating kinetics and heat integration under real flue-gas conditions.