An active, stable cubic molybdenum carbide catalyst for the high-temperature reverse water-gas shift reaction

Although technologically promising, the reduction of carbon dioxide (CO₂) to produce carbon monoxide (CO) remains economically challenging owing to the lack of an inexpensive, active, highly selective, and stable catalyst. We show that nanocrystalline cubic molybdenum carbide (α-Mo₂C), prepared through a facile and scalable route, offers 100% selectivity for CO₂ reduction to CO while maintaining its initial equilibrium conversion at high space velocity after more than 500 hours of exposure to harsh reaction conditions at 600°C. The combination of operando and postreaction characterization of the catalyst revealed that its high activity, selectivity, and stability are attributable to crystallographic phase purity, weak CO-Mo₂C interactions, and interstitial oxygen atoms, respectively. Mechanistic studies and density functional theory (DFT) calculations provided evidence that the reaction proceeds through an H₂-aided redox mechanism.