Low-temperature methanation of CO in coke oven gas using single nanosized Co3O4 catalysts

Nanosized Co3O4 materials with different particle sizes (20, 40, and 80 nm) can be prepared through facile approaches. Nanosized Co3O4 materials were characterized using BET, XRD, TEM, XPS, CO-TPD and H2-TPR. The activities of all the samples were tested in terms of percentage of CO conversion and CH4 selectivity, when single nanosized Co3O4 materials were used as catalysts for the methanation of CO in coke oven gas. The results showed the activity of the 20 nm nanosized Co3O4 materials achieved 100% CO conversion at temperatures as low as 450 K at space velocity of 5000 h− 1, was much higher than that of larger particle size catalysts. The higher gas hourly space velocity had a negative effect on the catalytic activity.

► Nanosized Co3O4 with different particle sizes can be prepared by facile approaches.
► Nanosized Co3O4 with different particle sizes are used for the CO methanation in COG.
► The activity of 20 nm Co3O4 was much higher than that of larger particle catalysts.