Suppression of CO on methanol decomposition over SnO2 catalysts

Methanol conversion was studied in the temperature range 350–400 °C at atmospheric pressure over a SnO2 catalyst. The results show SnO2 catalyzed methanol conversion to form methane, carbon dioxide and hydrogen selectively. This suggests that formaldehyde was an intermediate in producing methyl formate, which readily decomposed into methane and carbon dioxide. Both activity and selectivity were found to be independent on the specific surface area. The deactivation of the catalyst at high temperature was attributed to the decrease of surface area by formation of metallic tin.