New Material as Support for Nickel Boride Catalyst

D. ACOSTA, J. MARTINEZ, C. CARRERA, E. ERDMANN, E. GONZO AND H. DESTÉFANIS

LATIN AMERICAN APPLIED RESEARCH

Año: 2006 vol. 36 p. 317 - 320

0327-0793

The main objective of this work is to study the feasibility of new materials to be used as support for boron-nickel catalysts. Potential support materials such as: silica gel, alumina, hydrothermal modified Perlites and zeolite 4A, were characterized by BET, TPR and DRX. After the addition of Ni and B, their catalytic activity evaluated with the nitrobenzene hydrogenation model reaction.  The influence of operational parameters during the impregnation process such as order of reactants, speed of agitation, time of aging and it influences from the previous thermal treatment were evaluated. The results show that the adequate materials to be used as catalysts supports are the commercial silica and Rehydroxilated Perlite. It is due to the existence of superficial OH groups, which allow the anchorage of the nickel boride catalyst. Keywords-- Supported catalyst-nickel boride-Perlite.