HI-Light: A Glass-Waveguide-Based “Shell-and-Tube” Photothermal Reactor Platform for Converting CO₂ to Fuels

Highlights

• A glass-waveguide-based “shell-and-tube” type photothermal reactor was developed

• The reactor exhibited a high photothermal catalytic performance for CO₂ reduction

• The modular reactor has potential for scale-up, both in diameter and length

• The reactor design improves light distribution and reactant/catalyst mixing

Summary

In this work, we introduce HI-Light, a surface-engineered glass-waveguide-based “shell-and-tube” type photothermal reactor which is both scalable in diameter and length. We examine the effect of temperature, light irradiation, and residence time on its photo-thermocatalytic performance for CO₂ hydrogenation to form CO, with a cubic phase defect-laden indium oxide, In2O3-x(OH)y, catalyst. We demonstrate the light enhancement effect under a variety of reaction conditions. Notably, the light-on performance for the cubic nanocrystal photocatalyst exhibits a CO evolution rate at 15.40 mmol g_cat⁻¹ hr⁻¹ at 300°C and atmospheric pressure. This is 20 times higher conversion rate per unit catalyst mass per unit time beyond previously reported In2O3-x(OH)y catalyst in the cubic form under comparable operation conditions and more than 5 times higher than that of its rhombohedral polymorph. This result underscores that improvement in photo-thermocatalytic reactor design enables uniform light distribution and better reactant/catalyst mixing, thus significantly improving catalyst utilization.