Selective hydrogenation of acetylene in excess ethylene over SiO2 supported Au–Ag bimetallic catalyst

Supported gold nanocatalysts have been reported to be active in selective hydrogenation of acetylene. In this work, SiO2 supported Au–Ag bimetallic catalyst is studied in the selective hydrogenation of acetylene in excess ethylene. Au and Ag were reductively deposited on a silica surface functionalized by APTES (3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane). They form Au–Ag alloy nanoparticles of very small size. The catalytic activity of Au–Ag bimetallic system showed better catalytic activity at high temperature than that of monometallic gold catalyst. According to the TEM and XRD results, Ag stabilized the nanoparticles against sintering during high temperature calcinations. Non-thermal O2 plasma was applied to remove the APTES under mild conditions instead of high temperature calcination. The results showed that the conversion of acetylene was much higher over Au–Ag/SiO2 catalyst pretreated by O2 plasma than that of pretreated by calcination at 500 °C, although the latter catalyst had similar particle size.

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► Au–Ag/SiO2 is used in catalyzing selective hydrogenation of C2H2 in large excess of C2H4.
► O2 plasma treatment promoted the catalytic activity of Au–Ag/SiO2.
► Au–Ag/SiO2 shows better catalytic activity than Au/SiO2.
► Ag stabilizes the nanoparticles against sintering and helps to activate H2.