Soot low-temperature combustion on Cu–Zr/ZSM-5 catalysts in O2/He and NO/O2/He atmospheres

Zirconium doped Cu/ZSM-5 catalysts were prepared and characterized in this investigation. Catalytic activity during soot combustion was determined in both O2/He and NO/O2/He atmospheres by temperature-programmed oxidation. The use of zirconium reduces the temperature of maximum soot oxidation rate by 229 °C in O2/He atmosphere and 270 °C in NO/O2/He atmosphere. The promoting effect of zirconium is discussed in terms of surface dispersion, enrichment of active components, and creation of oxygen vacancies where molecular oxygen or NOx is adsorbed forming basic surface oxygen species active for soot oxidation. The NO2 formed at the copper–zirconium interface sites leads to the ignition temperature being significantly decreased to 93 °C, which is inside the exhaust temperature range of diesel engines. To understand the combustion reaction kinetics, the activation energy and reaction order of soot combustion were evaluated. According to the Redhead method, the activation energy for non-catalyzed reaction is 164 kJ/mol under the O2/He atmosphere. For the Cu/ZSM-5 and Cu–Zr/ZSM-5, the activation energies under the O2/He atmosphere (134–151 kJ/mol) are slightly higher than those under the NO/O2/He atmosphere (128–135 kJ/mol). The Freeman–Carroll method is suitable to describe the soot combustion in the NO/O2/He atmosphere, with the activation energies for the catalysts in the range of 97–112 kJ/mol and the average value of reaction order equal to 1.36.