Authors: Débora Regina Strossi Pedrolo
Source: SPIRE - Sciences Po Institutional REpository (preprint, 2021-12-14)
Field: Chemistry — Inorganic Chemistry

Synthesis of metal-zeolite composite materials for bifunctional catalytic reactions Zeolite-based catalysts have been widely used in the conversion of biomass. The catalytic yields of the desired products are strongly limited due to the relatively small size of the pores in zeolites and the catalyst preparation by impregnation usually leads to relatively large metal nanoparticles and low contact between metal and acid sites. The purpose of this work is the design of metal-zeolite nanocomposite catalysts containing ruthenium nanoparticles uniformly distributed in the hierarchical BEA and ZSM-5 zeolites. Use of ruthenium avoids formation of inert hardly reducible inert metal silicates and metal aluminates, while carbon nanotubes with supported metal oxide nanoparticles play a role of sacrificial template, which allows creating mesoporosity and bringing metallic functionality inside the zeolite matrix. Compared to the conventional zeolite supported metal catalysts the synthesized hierarchical ruthenium-zeolites exhibited much higher activity and lower methane selectivity in Fischer-Tropsch synthesis. Characterization of the prepared catalysts has indicated initiation of crystallization of zeolites over metal nanoparticles. This effect has been further used to increase the dispersion of metal nanoparticles by secondary crystallization of Ru supported over ZSM-5. Our results show significant re-dispersion of embedded metal oxide nanoparticles and increase in the activity of model reactions. In addition, a synthetic strategy was developed for the preparation of hierarchical metal and zeolite nanocomposite catalysts for direct synthesis of iso-paraffins from syngas. The nanocomposites are synthesized in three steps. In the first step, the parent (core) zeolite is etched with an ammonium fluoride solution. The etching creates small mesopores inside the zeolite crystals. In the second step, the Ru nanoparticles prepared using water-in-oil microemulsion are deposited in the mesopores of the zeolite. In the third step, a zeolite shell of MFI-type zeolites (silicalite-1 or ZSM-5) is grown on the parent zeolite crystals coating both the etched surface and metallic nanoparticles. Thus, the metal nanoparticles become entirely encapsulated inside the zeolite matrix. Most important parameters such as ruthenium content, zeolite mesoporosity, and more particularly, the acidity of the catalyst shell, which affect the catalytic performance of the synthesized nanocomposite materials in low-temperature Fischer−Tropsch synthesis were identified in this work. The higher relative amount of iso-paraffins was observed on the catalysts containing a shell of ZSM-5. The proximity between metal and acid sites in the zeolite shell of the nanocomposite catalysts is a crucial parameter for the design of efficient metal zeolite bifunctional catalysts for selective synthesis of gasoline-type fuels via Fischer−Tropsch synthesis, while the acidity of the catalyst core has only a limited impact on the catalytic performance. Bifunctional ; Zeolite ; Catalysis ; Composite number ; Metal ; Materials science ; Bifunctional catalyst ; Chemical engineering ; Chemistry ; Composite material ; Organic chemistry ; Metallurgy ; Engineering Zeolite Catalysis and Synthesis ; Nanomaterials for catalytic reactions ; Catalysis and Hydrodesulfurization Studies