Potassium regulating electronic state of zirconia supported palladium catalyst and hydrogen spillover for improved acetylene hydrogenation

Junjie Xu; Weixiong Huang; Ruiling Li; Li Li; Jinjin Ma; Jiaou Qi; Haiyan Ma; Min Ruan; Lilin Lu

doi:10.1016/j.jcis.2023.11.017

Potassium regulating electronic state of zirconia supported palladium catalyst and hydrogen spillover for improved acetylene hydrogenation

J Colloid Interface Sci. 2024 Feb:655:584-593. doi: 10.1016/j.jcis.2023.11.017. Epub 2023 Nov 4.

Authors

Junjie Xu¹, Weixiong Huang², Ruiling Li², Li Li², Jinjin Ma², Jiaou Qi², Haiyan Ma², Min Ruan³, Lilin Lu⁴

Affiliations

¹ The State Key Laboratory of Refractories and Metallurgy, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China; Hubei Province Key Laboratory of Coal Conversion and New Carbon Materials, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China; Hubei Key Laboratory of Mine Environmental Pollution Control & Remediation, Mineral Processing Research Institute, Hubei Polytechnic University, Huangshi 435003, China.
² The State Key Laboratory of Refractories and Metallurgy, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China; Hubei Province Key Laboratory of Coal Conversion and New Carbon Materials, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China.
³ Hubei Key Laboratory of Mine Environmental Pollution Control & Remediation, Mineral Processing Research Institute, Hubei Polytechnic University, Huangshi 435003, China. Electronic address: ruanmin@hbpu.edu.cn.
⁴ The State Key Laboratory of Refractories and Metallurgy, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China; Hubei Province Key Laboratory of Coal Conversion and New Carbon Materials, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China. Electronic address: lulilin@wust.edu.cn.

PMID: 37956546
DOI: 10.1016/j.jcis.2023.11.017

Abstract

High-selectivity acetylene hydrogenation to produce ethylene is an important issue of removing acetylene impurity in ethylene for industrial polyethylene production. Developing high-efficiency catalyst with excellent ethylene selectivity and catalytic durability is desirable but still challenging. In this work, potassium doped palladium catalysts supported on zirconia with different K contents (Pd/ZrO₂-xK) have been developed to catalyze acetylene hydrogenation, the Pd/ZrO₂-16K exhibits impressive catalytic performance with acetylene conversion of 100 %, ethylene selectivity of 81 % and high catalytic durability. In situ diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform spectroscopy (DRIFTS), in situ synchrotron radiation photoionization mass spectrometry (SR-PIMS) and density functional theory (DFT) calculations reveal that K doping effectively weakens the adsorption of ethylene by regulating the electronic state of catalyst to improve ethylene selectivity and substantially lowers the barriers of hydrogen activation and transfer reactions to favor hydrogen spillover, thus conferring a remarkably improved durability on the Pd/ZrO₂-16K catalysts.

Keywords: Acetylene hydrogenation; Hydrogen spillover regulation; Pd/ZrO(2) catalyst; Tuning electronic state.