Hydrogen peroxide decomposition on a two-component CuO-Cr2O3 catalyst

Abstract

Some physical and catalytic properties of the two-component copper(II)oxide-chromium(III)oxide catalyst with different content of both components were studied using the decomposition of the aqueous solution of hydrogen peroxide as a testing reaction. It has been found that along to both basic components, the system under study contains also the spinel structure CuCr2O4, chromate washable by water and hexavalent ions of chromium unwashable by water. The soluble chromate is catalytically active. During the first period of the reaction the equilibrium is being established in both homogeneous and heterogeneous catalytic systems. The catalytic activity as well as the specific surface area of the washed solid is a non-monotonous function of its composition. It seems highly probable that the extreme values of both these quantities are not connected with the detected admixtures in the catalytic system. The system under study is very insensitive with regard to the applied doses of gamma radiation. Its catalytic properties are changed rather significantly after the thermal treatment and particularly after the partial reduction to low degree by hydrogen. The observed changes of the catalytic activity of the system under study are very probably in connection with the changes of the valence state of the catalytically active components of the catalyst.