Industrially potential MoVNbTeOx@FoamSiC structured catalyst for oxidative dehydrogenation of ethane

Abstract

Oxidative dehydrogenation of ethane (ODHE) is a highly exothermic process. Structured catalyst is one of the potential methods to achieve industrial applications. The main hurdles are heat removal and coating stability. Here we adopt highly thermal conductive Foam SiC as the structured support and propose three strategies to intensify the coating stability. The prepared structured catalysts present excellent heat transfer and the catalytic performance (i.e., 1.77 kgC2H4/kgcat/h) has reached the industrial goal. A “Dual Interfaces” coating stability mechanism is proposed. The mechanism provides fundamental guidelines for successful development of three strategies of preparing stable coating. The results indicate that proper calcination treatment facilitates good coating adhesion without activity loss, and adding the binding agent, or the strategy of “stabilize the coating, then activate the catalyst” can achieve both robust coating and fair catalytic performance. Briefly, these results pave the way for industrial applications of ODHE and enlighten other heterogeneous catalysis processes.