Preparation of CuO/ZnO/Nb2O5 catalyst for the water-gas shift reaction

Abstract CuO/ZnO/Nb 2 O 5 catalyst was prepared by combining the co-precipitation and deposition-precipitation preparation methods in order to develop a novel catalyst for water-gas shift reaction. The effect of alumina substitution for niobia and the influence of zinc oxide presence were evaluated by comparing the catalytic activity of CuO/ZnO/Nb 2 O 5 catalyst with CuO/ZnO/Al 2 O 3 and CuO/Nb 2 O 5 catalytic activities. Nitrogen physisorption, X-ray diffraction, Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, N 2 O titration and temperature-programmed reduction analysis were performed to evaluate the physicochemical properties of the materials and the catalytic tests were carried out under near-industrial conditions. CuO/Nb 2 O 5 catalyst was inactive during all catalytic tests while CuO/ZnO/Nb 2 O 5 catalyst exhibited significant higher TOF values compared with CuO/ZnO/Al 2 O 3 . Catalytic activity measurements revealed that zinc presence was important for catalytic activity under the studied conditions and indicated that the replacement of Al 2 O 3 by Nb 2 O 5 in the ternary catalyst as well as the presence of residual hydroxycarbonates promoted the catalytic activity.