Abstract
Bimetallic NixCu(10−x)/γ-Al2O3 catalysts (where x is the mass fraction of Ni) with different Ni/Cu mass ratios were prepared. The catalysts were characterized by X-ray diffractometry, N2 adsorption–desorption, inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, H2-temperature programmed reduction, and transmission electron microscopy. The effect of Ni/Cu mass ratio on benzofuran hydrodeoxygenation was investigated in a fixed-flow reactor. Cu addition improved the NiO reducibility. The strong interaction of Ni and Cu led to the formation of smaller and highly dispersed CuO and NiO species over γ-Al2O3, which favors an improvement in catalytic activity. Among the as-prepared catalysts, the Ni5Cu5/γ-Al2O3 showed the highest deoxygenated product yield (79.9%) with an acceptable benzofuran conversion of 95.2%, which increased by 18.3% and 16.9% compared with that of the monometallic Ni/γ-Al2O3 catalyst. A possible reaction network was proposed, which would provide insight into benzofuran hydrodeoxygenation over the Ni5Cu5/γ-Al2O3 catalyst.
Highlights
In recent years, the increasing combustion of fossil fuels has led to a global energy crisis and environmental issues
Bio-oil appears to be a possible replacement for fossil fuels, which can be derived from biomass via rapid pyrolysis [1]
For fresh bimetallic Nix Cu(10−x) /γ-Al2 O3 catalysts, no obvious peaks that were related to NiO and CuO species were detected, which indicates that the metal oxides were small and beyond the X-ray diffractometry (XRD) detection limit
Summary
The increasing combustion of fossil fuels has led to a global energy crisis and environmental issues. Bio-oil that was produced by rapid pyrolysis contains a mass of oxygenated compounds, such as acids, phenolic, esters, alcohols, and furans [2]. Non-noble metal catalysts, and especially transition metals have been investigated extensively and the bimetallic catalysts show acceptable HDO activity. Catalysts 2020, 10, 274 introduction contributed to a decrease in reduction temperature of the metal oxides and better particle dispersion. Fe-Co/SiO2 catalysts on the HDO of pine sawdust bio-oil, which demonstrated that the bimetallic catalysts had a better HDO performance compared with monometallic Fe/SiO2 or Co/SiO2 catalysts because of the synergistic effect of Fe and Co. The effect of transition-metal Cu on monometallic catalysts, such as Ni/SBA-15, was studied because it can decrease the metal-oxide reduction temperature and contribute to the formation of small crystallites of Ni sites in the Ni/SBA-15 catalyst [16].
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