Characterization and dehydrogenation activity of Cr-added electroless plated copper catalyst Original Research Article

Copper catalysts with chromium addition, prepared by the electroless plating method, were investigated. Dehydrogenation of n-butanol was conducted to study the effect of chromium addition on the catalysts. Copper loading on γ-Al2O3 was fixed at 15% and Cr addition varied from 1 to 5%. Experimental results show that the copper catalyst activity depends not only on the chromium loading but also on the addition procedure. The catalysts with chromium addition present higher catalyst activity and lower deactivation rate than the pure one. X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns show that the addition would increase copper dispersion and hence decrease copper crystallite size formed on the support. Temperature-programmed reduction (TPR) profiles indicate that the addition of chromium affects the copper reduction temperature. Chromium addition would cause the TPR curve to shift slightly to lower temperature.