Ni nanoparticles supported on AlO + LaO yolk-shell catalyst for photo-assisted thermal decomposition of methane.

Catalytic methane decomposition (CMD) has emerged as an appealing technology for large-scale production of H and carbon nanostructures from natural gas. As the CMD process is mildly endothermic, the application of concentrated renewable energy sources such as solar energy under a low-temperature regime could potentially represent a promising approach towards CMD process operation. Herein, Ni/AlO-LaO yolk-shell catalysts are fabricated using a straightforward single-step hydrothermal approach and tested for their performance in photothermal CMD. We show that the morphology of the resulting materials, dispersion and reducibility of Ni nanoparticles, and nature of metal-support interactions can be tuned by addition of varying amounts of La. Notably, the addition of an optimal amount of La (Ni/Al-20La) improved the H yield and catalyst stability relative to the base Ni/AlO material, while also favoring base growth of carbon nanofibers. Additionally, we show for the first time a photothermal effect in CMD, whereby the introduction of 3 suns light irradiation at a constant bulk temperature of 500 °C reversibly increased the H yield of catalyst by about 1.2 times relative to the rate in the dark, accompanied by a decrease in apparent activation energy from 41.6 kJ mol to 32.5 kJ mol. The light irradiation further suppressed undesirable CO co-production at low temperatures. Our work reveals photothermal catalysis as a promising route for CMD while providing an insightful understanding of the roles of modifier in enriching methane activation sites on AlO-based catalysts.