In 2020, for example, Yuvuz and his colleagues reported in Science that a nickel and molybdenum-based catalyst is able to convert CO2 and methane to CO and hydrogen gas, an industrially valuable combination known as synthesis gas.

The mix of CO and H2, known as synthesis gas, then moves to a third reactor, which assembles them into more complex hydrocarbons.

Catalysts, along with heat and pressure, could then transform synthesis gas into gasoline and other liquid hydrocarbons.

The U.S. sanctions imposed in November banned purchases of Iranian petrochemical products which include “any aromatic, olefin, and synthesis gas, and any of their derivatives, including ethylene, propylene, butadiene, benzene, toluene, xylene, ammonia, methanol, and urea”.

Adding in more hydrogen to the carbon monoxide turns it into what's called synthesis gas.