Bench-Scale Synthesis of High-Surface-Area Two-Dimensional Siloxene as the Support for Dry Reforming Catalysts

Abstract

Developing better supports for catalysts is vital for improving the dry reforming of methane (DRM) process, which turns greenhouse gases into useful industrial products. Siloxene, a two-dimensional material made from silicon, is a promising new option because it has a high surface area, can be tuned for specific tasks, and is very stable. This study focuses on making high-quality siloxene quickly using a specific chemical method at 0°C. The siloxene we created was used to support a nickel (Ni) catalyst, and it performed much better than traditional silica (SiO2) supports. The best catalyst, 5%Ni/3h-Siloxene, achieved a high initial conversion of 96.3% for CO2 and 76.59% for CH4. Over a 10-hour test, the siloxene catalyst was remarkably stable, with only a tiny 2% drop in CO2 conversion. This happened even though it had a lot of carbon buildup (44.49%). In contrast, the standard Ni/SiO2 catalyst, which had only 4.19% carbon, had a much bigger performance drop of 5%. Our findings suggest that the type of carbon that forms is more important than the amount. This makes siloxene a very promising material for long-term DRM applications.