Facile Preparation and Promising Hydrothermal Stability of Spherical γ-Alumina Support with High Specific Surface Area

It is of great importance to develop a spherical gamma-alumina support with high hydrothermal stability to be used in platinum reforming catalyst processes. The porous pseudo-boehmite powder with a high surface area was first synthesized via a simple separate nucleation and aging steps method, and was then used as a precursor to produce a spherical gamma-Al2O3 support via an oil-ammonia column method. The as-synthesized pseudo-boehmite has a substantially greater specific surface area of 336.0 m(2)center dot g(-1) in comparison with the commercial Sasol boehmite powder (293.0 m(2)center dot g(-1)) from Sasol Chemicals. In addition, the as-prepared spherical gamma-Al2O3 support derived from the as-synthesized pseudo-boehmite also possesses a higher specific surface area of 280.0 m(2)center dot g(-1) compared to the corresponding Sasol sample. Moreover, the as-prepared spherical gamma-Al2O3 balls demonstrate a much higher specific surface area of 185.0 m(2)center dot g(-1) compared with the Sasol sample of 142.0 m(2)center dot g(-1) after hydrothermal tests at 600 C, suggesting its promising application in the chemical industry.