Catalytic activities of various types-supported nickel nanoparticles for benzene hydrogenation

Benzene is naturally present in gasoline, but since this compound is severely carcinogenic, and environmental laws limit the amount of this compound in less than 1%, several methods have been developed to remove this compound. Hydrogenation of unsaturated compounds as benzene for producing the eco-friendly intermediate materials such as cyclohexane is one of the most low-cost and useful methods in industry [1]. It has been found that the activity of the nickel catalysts for this reaction depends on various parameters. One of them is the nature of the supports as it may affect the properties of the active phase (metallic function). Other parameters include of the dispersion and the reducibility of the metallic phase, the preparation method, the pre-treatment conditions as drying and calcination, and reduction of catalyst [1, 2]. In this research, we prepared a series of different Ni-supported catalysts as HZSM-5, SBA-15, activated carbon (AC) and MIL-101. These powder catalysts were characterized by FT-IR, UV-vis DRS, XRD and N2 adsorption-desorption techniques. The impregnated catalysts were loaded in the fixed-bed microreactor and tested in the range of 403-463 K and at atmospheric pressure. The reactor results indicate that the best benzene conversion and selectivity to cyclohexane is achieved for Ni-SBA-15 ( 88%) at 423 K and Ni-AC ( 61%) at 443 K. Also, by calculating the benzene yield, it can be concluded that the acceptable performance was obtain for Ni-AC catalyst at 443 K.