In situ study of the impact of sorbitol addition on the structure and performance of promoted SiO2-supported cobalt catalysts for Fischer-Tropsch synthesis

摘要

Introduction Fischer-Tropsch (FT) synthesis produces clean fuels from natural gas, coal and biomass. Cobalt supported catalysts are particularly suitable for the production of middle distillates and waxes, and it is known that the metal dispersion and reducibility are directly linked to the number of active sites and performance of FT catalysts [1, 2]. Our previous reports [2, 3] have shown that in this respect, the decomposition of cobalt precursors is a crucial step in the design of cobalt supported catalysts. This paper addresses an in situ study of cobalt precursor decomposition in Ru-promoted SiO2-supported catalysts prepared with addition of sorbitol in the impregnation solution, and its impact on Co dispersion and number of surface active metal sites.