Methanation of carbon oxides on Ni/Ce/SBA-15 pretreated with dielectric barrier discharge plasma

Abstract

Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P catalyst prepared by the dielectric barrier discharge plasma method (DBD) was investigated for carbon oxides methanation in the fixed-bed reaction. The characterization results of N2 adsorption-desorption, XRD and TEM indicated that Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P catalyst was ordered mesoporous structure. XRD and TEM revealed that Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P catalyst had the minimum nickel particle size among the tested catalysts. The catalytic methanation activity of Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P assisted by DBD was better than that of Ni/SBA-15-C and Ni/Ce/SBA-15-C by the calcination method. After 30-h CO methanation at 650 °C, CH4 yield of Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P decreased from 84.9% to 73.1% while CH4 yield of Ni/Ce/SBA-15-C decreased from 63.2% to 37.3% at 400 °C, suggesting that the Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P catalyst has good high-temperature stability. As indicated by TG results, the amount of carbon deposition on the spent Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P catalyst was lower than that on the spent Ni/Ce/SBA-15-C catalyst. For Ni/Ce/SBA-15-P, the excellent performance and the good anti-coke forming ability are associated with the small Ni particle size.