Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Thermally stable nickel-alumina catalysts useful for methanation and other reactions and method of the manufacture of said catalysts

Patent ·
OSTI ID:6173386
Union Oil Co. of California's novel precipitative-occlusion method of catalyst preparation yields nickel-alumina catalysts having a remarkably high degree of thermal stability, and active for the hydrogenation of carbon oxides (methanation), steam reforming, gasification, etc. This method involves digesting a slurry of an alumina hydrate (preferably boehmite) in an aqueous solution of an ammino complex of a nickel salt. The digestion is carried out at a temperature sufficiently high to decompose the ammino complex and release the nickel (II) ions. This results in a gradual precipitation of nickel hydroxide in the pores and interstices formed by the agglomerating particles of alumina hydrate. The coflocculated solids are recovered as by filtration, washed, dried, and calcined. The resulting compositions prove, in high-temperature reactions such as methanation, to retain their activity for much longer periods of time than do conventional nickel-alumina catalysts prepared by the widely used technique of coprecipitation.
Assignee:
Union Oil Co. of California
Patent Number(s):
US 4042532
OSTI ID:
6173386
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English