KCl Promoted Cobalt-iron Nanocatalysts Supported on Silica: Catalytic Performance and Characterization in Fischer-Tropsch Synthesis

The sio2 supported cobalt-iron nano catalysts were prepared by the sol-gel method. this research investigated the effects of (co/fe) wt%, different co/fe ratios at different temperatures and loading of kcl wt% for fisher-tropsch synthesis (fts). the results showed that the catalyst containing 50 wt% (co/fe)/sio2 (co/fe ratio is 70/30) promoted with 0.6 wt% kcl is an optimal nano catalyst for conversion co + h2 to a range of hydrocarbons especially light olefins. the results also indicated that optimal operating conditions for optimal nano catalyst are 250 °c, and h2/co molar ratio 2/1 under 1 bar of pressure. characterization of catalyst precursors and calcined catalysts were performed by different methods such as: powder x-ray diffraction (xrd), transmission electron microscopy (tem), n2 physisorption and thermal analysis methods such as thermal gravimetric analysis (tga) and differential scanning calorimetry (dsc).