Catalytic oxidation of hydrocarbons over Co3O4 catalyst prepared by CVD

The total oxidation of C2H2, C3H6, C3H8, n-C4H8, n-C4H10 and i-C4H10 was studied in a monolithic flow reactor under temperature-programmed mode and highly diluted conditions. The non-catalytic combustion of the investigated hydrocarbons leads to a substantial formation of CO and traces of methane at intermediate temperatures. This drawback was suppressed upon the deposition of a thin layer of Co3O4 on the monolith and all investigated hydrocarbons tend to light off at 250–290 °C. The apparent activation energy was found to exhibit a linear correlation with the C–H bond dissociation energy, indicating that the C–H activation is still the rate-limiting step.