The teraton challenge. A review of fixation and transformation of carbon dioxide

The increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide is linked to climate changes; hence there is an urgent need to reduce the accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere. The utilization of CO2 as a raw material in the synthesis of chemicals and liquid energy carriers offers a way to mitigate the increasing CO2 buildup.

This review covers six important CO2 transformations namely: chemical transformations, photochemical reductions, chemical and electrochemical reductions, biological conversions, reforming and inorganic transformations. Furthermore, the vast research area of carbon capture and storage is reviewed briefly.

This review is intended as an introduction to CO2, its synthetic reactions and their possible role in future CO2 mitigation schemes that has to match the scale of man-made CO2 in the atmosphere, which rapidly approaches 1 teraton.