(595f) Ni Catalysts with Different Promoters Supported on Zeolite for Dry Reforming of Methane

Raja AL Otaibi¹, Feraih Alenazey¹, Faisal Alotaibi¹, Ahmed S. Al-Fatesh², Anis H. Fakeeha²

¹ P.O. Box 6086 Riyadh 11442, King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

² King Saud University , Riyadh, KSA

Corresponding author: raletabi@kacst.edu.sa

Abstract

Dry (CO₂) reforming of methane (DRM) is a well-studied reaction that is of both scientific and industrial importance. It combines CH₄, the main component of natural gasused as source of energy, and CO₂, a major challenging greenhouse gas, where by an impact can be made to limit global warming. This reaction produces syngas that can be used to produce a wide range of products, such as higher alkanes and oxygenates by means of Fischer–Tropsch synthesis. The reaction is particularly interesting because both CH₄and CO₂ are available feedstocks due to their natural abundance. Therefore it  is a good alternative to  steam reforming , which is generally used for synthetic gas (CO/H₂) production in the industry because it yields lower H₂/CO ratios. DRM is considered a high endothermic reaction and requires operating temperatures of 700–1000 °C to achieve high equilibrium conversion of CH₄ and CO₂ to H₂ and CO. The most widely used catalysts for DRM are based on Ni. However, many of these catalysts undergo severe deactivation due to carbon deposition. Noble metals have also been investigated and are usually found to be more resistant to carbon deposition than Ni catalysts, but are generally uneconomical. In this investigation, we aim to study the effect of lanthanum and calcium as promoters for Ni catalyst supported on two different zeolite for dry reforming of methane. Several catalysts of promoted Ni/ on Y-Zeolite have been prepared by impregnation method. The physicochemical properties of the prepared catalysts were characterized with (XRD), (SEM), (TEM) (BET) and XRF. These catalyst were tested for dry reforming of methane in a micro tubular reactor using temperature ranges of 700 °C at atmospheric pressure using total flow rate = 40 ml/min  (CH₄ =15 ml/min , CO₂ =15 ml/min & N₂ = 10 ml/min). It was found that, Ca –Ni/Zeolite (CBV300 ) gave the highest conversion (51%) with the average selectivity of hydrogen (47%). Ni/Zeolite showed  very low conversion due to rapid deactivation of catalyst compared to La –Ni/Zeolite and Ca –Ni/Zeolite  which present the enhancement of the promoters to the Ni/Zeolite .