Desarrollo de nuevos catalizadores de reformado de bioetanol para la producción sostenible de H2

Abstract

[EN] Throughout this Thesis it has been proposed various catalysts promoted with Ni or Co for the production of hydrogen from ethanol reforming. It has been studied their synthesis, physicochemical properties and catalytic behavior in order to find the most active, selective and stable catalysts. In Chapter 3 is presented the study of commercial zeolite Y and Mordenite mesoporosed and exchanged with Na. The use of mesoporous zeolites as support has allowed to prepare ethanol reforming catalysts with high activity, high selectivity to H2 and low selectivities to CO and CH4. Besides these commercial zeolites have been also prepared and studied the delaminated zeolites promoted with Ni or Co. The catalysts prepared with these zeolites showed high activity compared to a reference sample prepared with amorphous silica as support. In Chapter 4 are shown the results obtained in the study of catalysts based on LDH-Zn promoted with different amounts of Ni and Co. Among them, 20CoHT showed the best results. However, this catalyst exhibited a large coke deposition. In order to reduce the high production of coke a new formulation was prepared incorporating La. The addition of La decreased significantly the coke deposition and increased slightly the reducibility of Co. These improvements led to a new formulation with high reactivity, selectivity and stability. In Chapter 5 it has been prepared and studied catalysts based on structured manganese oxides (SMO) promoted with Ni and Co. The SMO prepared in this Thesis have been based on birnessite-BIR and todorokite-TOD, with laminar and microporous structure, respectively. All SMO studied have shown high activity and selectivity to H2, with low yields of CO and CH4. Nevertheless, the best results were obtained with Co-TOD sample with high activity and selectivity to H2, and the lowest selectivities to CO, CH4 and byproducts. In Chapter 6 the use of natural sepiolite is presented as support of Ni and Co. In this chapter it has been studied the influence of two different Ni and Co incorporation methods on the catalytic performance. It has been found that the precipitation method allows the formation of metal particles of Ni and Co significantly smaller than the impregnation method, leading to more active catalysts in the reforming of ethanol. The catalyst Co-Sep produced the highest concentrations of H2 and lowest concentrations of undesired products. Finally, in Chapter 7, it has been selected two catalysts in order to study their stability and influence of pelletization process in their catalytic activity. The catalysts selected were those that presented the best balance activity-selectivity and simplicity of the preparation method. These catalysts have been CoLaHT and Co-Sep. Initially the catalytic behavior of these materials in restored vinasse (alcoholic wine industry waste) was studied. The sepiolite-based catalysts (Co-Sep) presented excellent results, maintaining its activity for more than 160 hours of reaction. This catalyst was also studied in the reforming of other…