Propane dehydrogenation performance of titanosilicate-1 supported CoOx catalysts by adjusting the acidity and reducibility

The development of low-cost and toxicity-free cobalt oxide-based catalysts for propane dehydrogenation to propylene (PDH) has gained momentum. In this paper, titanosilicate-1 (TS-1) supported CoOx catalysts doped with different alkali and alkaline earth metal ions (M = Na, K, Mg, Ca and Ba) were prepared by adjusting the acidity, reducibility and oxidation state to increase the activity and stability during the PDH reaction. It was found that the decrease in the number of Lewis acid sites and lack of Co2+Ox species with the addition of K ions led to an almost complete loss of the activity of the Co-K catalyst. However, Co-Ca catalyst exhibited moderate acidity, more Lewis acid sites, a larger amount of the in-situ formed highly-dispersed metallic Co-0 nanoparticles (similar to 5 nm) and Co2+Ox species strongly interacting with the support, all of which were responsible for its highest space-time yield (STY) of propylene formation (0.88 kg h(-1) kg(cat.)(-1)). Though Co3O4 particles were more active for the side reactions, they could be readily reduced to metallic Co-0 nanoparticles during the PDH process, and increased the selectivity to propylene with time on stream. Specifically, it was demonstrated that the highly-dispersed metallic Co-0 nanoparticles were also active for the PDH activity, but was lower than Co2+Ox species that were strongly interacted with TS-1 support. The deposited coke on the catalysts was related to the catalyst deactivation. The Co-0 species could not completely return to the oxidation states after burning off the deposited coke, which seemed to be related to the incomplete recovery of catalytic activity after regeneration.