Bridging the Time Gap: A Copper/Zinc Oxide/Aluminum Oxide Catalyst for Methanol Synthesis Studied under Industrially Relevant Conditions and Time Scales.
Long-term stability of catalysts is an important factor in the chemical industry. This factor is often underestimated in academic testing methods, which may lead to a time gap in the field of catalytic research. The deactivation behavior of an industrially relevant Cu/ZnO/Al2 O3 catalyst for the synthesis of methanol is reported over a period of 148 days time-on-stream (TOS). The process was investigated by a combination of quasi in situ and ex situ analysis techniques. The results show that ZnO is the most dynamic species in the catalyst, whereas only slight changes can be observed in the Cu nanoparticles. Thus, the deactivation of this catalyst is driven by the changes in the ZnO moieties. Our findings indicate that methanol synthesis is an interfacially mediated process between Cu and ZnO.
Department of Inorganic Chemistry, Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck Gesellschaft, Faradayweg 4-6, 14195, Berlin, Germany. lunkenbein@fhi-berlin.mpg.de.
Thomas
T
Lunkenbein
Department of Inorganic Chemistry, Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck Gesellschaft, Faradayweg 4-6, 14195, Berlin, Germany.
Frank
F
Girgsdies
Hamburg University of Technology, Institute of Chemical Reaction Engineering, Eißendorfstr. 38, 21073, Hamburg, Germany.
Timur
T
Kandemir
Department of Chemistry, Nirmalagiri College, Kannur, Kerala, India.
Nygil
N
Thomas
University of Duisburg-Essen, Faculty of Chemistry and CENIDE, Universitätsstrasse 7, 45141, Essen, Germany.
Malte
M
Behrens
Department of Inorganic Chemistry, Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck Gesellschaft, Faradayweg 4-6, 14195, Berlin, Germany.|Department of Heterogeneous Reactions, Max-Planck-Institute for Chemical Energy Conversion, Stiftstrasse 34-36, 45470, Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany.
Robert
R
Schlögl
Department of Inorganic Chemistry, Fritz-Haber-Institut der Max-Planck Gesellschaft, Faradayweg 4-6, 14195, Berlin, Germany. efrei@fhi-berlin.mpg.de.
Elias
E
Frei
catalyst deactivation; heterogeneous catalysis; interphase stability; methanol synthesis; quasi in situ measurements