Metal oxides modified NiO catalysts for oxidative dehydrogenation of ethane to ethylene

• The sol–gel method was extended to the preparation of Zr, Ti, Mo, W, and V modified NiO catalysts for the ethane oxidative dehydrogenation reaction. The metal oxide modification results in a significant effect on the catalytic performance of NiO based catalysts in ethane ODH reaction. The transition metal doped NiO catalysts have different level of activity and selectivity in this reaction, which is dependent on the nature of doping metal. Among these five catalysts the Ni–Ti–O and Ni–W–O show high ethylene selectivity; thus, the improved ethylene production efficiency is obtained in these two catalysts.

The sol–gel method was applied to the synthesis of Zr, Ti, Mo, W, and V modified NiO based catalysts for the ethane oxidative dehydrogenation reaction. The synthesized catalysts were characterized by XRD, N2 adsorption, SEM and TPR techniques. The results showed that the doping metals could be highly dispersed into NiO domains without the formation of large amount of other bulk metal oxide. The modified NiO materials have small particle size, larger surface area, and higher reduction temperature in contrast to pure NiO. The introduction of group IV, V and VI transition metals into NiO decreases the catalytic activity in ethane ODH. However, the ethylene selectivity is enhanced with the highest level for the Ni–W–O and Ni–Ti–O catalysts. As a result, these two catalysts show improved efficiency of ethylene production in the ethane ODH reaction.

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