Texture pore size

Maceral behaviour and interaction on carbonization Mesophase development during carbonization Relation of coke strength (stability) to coke texture, pore size distribution, pore wall thickness... 

One of the more important characteristics of a matrix is its porous texture which must allows good reactant and product fluxes in the catalyst bulk. According to its use, it is necessary to give to a catalyst a tailor-made texture (pore size and size distribution, pore volume and surface). Obtention of silica-alumina matrices with controlled texture is the aim of the present work. 

Soaking a siUca gel in dilute ammonium hydroxide solution at 50—85°C can result in significant coarsening of the gel texture (5). Aging and thermal treatments result in a one-way process, ie, loss of specific surface area and in increase in pore size. The pore size can also be enlarged by dissolution of some of the siUca. Treating a siUca gel with O.S-N KOH or dilute HF can enlarge the pores from 0.7 to 3.7 nm (3). 

Ultrafiltration utilizes membrane filters with small pore sizes ranging from O.OlS t to in order to collect small particles, to separate small particle sizes, or to obtain particle-free solutions for a variety of applications. Membrane filters are characterized by a smallness and uniformity of pore size difficult to achieve with cellulosic filters. They are further characterized by thinness, strength, flexibility, low absorption and adsorption, and a flat surface texture. These properties are useful for a variety of analytical procedures. In the analytical laboratory, ultrafiltration is especially useful for gravimetric analysis, optical microscopy, and X-ray fluorescence studies. 

Pore. size and surface area distribution. Pore sizes and pore volume distributions may be calculated from the relative pressures at which pores are filled (in the adsorption mode) or emptied (in the desorption mode). Fig. 3.45 shows the pore size distribution of a commercial y-alumina. The distribution is very broad both meso- and macropores are present. In practice this is usually a desired situation a texture consisting of a network of large pores (main roads) and small pores (side roads) is ideal. 

Catalyst characterization - Characterization of mixed metal oxides was performed by atomic emission spectroscopy with inductively coupled plasma atomisation (ICP-AES) on a CE Instraments Sorptomatic 1990. NH3-TPD was nsed for the characterization of acid site distribntion. SZ (0.3 g) was heated up to 600°C using He (30 ml min ) to remove adsorbed components. Then, the sample was cooled at room temperatnre and satnrated for 2 h with 100 ml min of 8200 ppm NH3 in He as carrier gas. Snbseqnently, the system was flashed with He at a flowrate of 30 ml min for 2 h. The temperatnre was ramped np to 600°C at a rate of 10°C min. A TCD was used to measure the NH3 desorption profile. Textural properties were established from the N2 adsorption isotherm. Snrface area was calcnlated nsing the BET equation and the pore size was calcnlated nsing the BJH method. The resnlts given in Table 33.4 are in good agreement with varions literature data. 

At 9 hours of immersion, instead, isotherms do not show the pore filling associated with mesopores, which in turn appears again between 25 and 26 hours. After 28 hours of soaking, no mesopore filling is observed (figure 3). The DFT pore size distributions also confirm the presence of mesopores (around 2.2 nm) only at 2 hours of immersion and between 25 and 26 hours. The peak at around 5 nm is probably due to the textural interparticles porosity (figure 3 inset). 

Pores are found in many solids and the term porosity is often used quite arbitrarily to describe many different properties of such materials. Occasionally, it is used to indicate the mere presence of pores in a material, sometimes as a measure for the size of the pores, and often as a measure for the amount of pores present in a material. The latter is closest to its physical definition. The porosity of a material is defined as the ratio between the pore volume of a particle and its total volume (pore volume + volume of solid) [1]. A certain porosity is a common feature of most heterogeneous catalysts. The pores are either formed by voids between small aggregated particles (textural porosity) or they are intrinsic structural features of the materials (structural porosity). According to the IUPAC notation, porous materials are classified with respect to their sizes into three groups microporous, mesoporous, and macroporous materials [2], Microporous materials have pores with diameters < 2 nm, mesoporous materials have pore diameters between 2 and 50 nm, and macroporous materials have pore diameters > 50 nm. Nowadays, some authors use the term nanoporosity which, however, has no clear definition but is typically used in combination with nanotechnology and nanochemistry for materials with pore sizes in the nanometer range, i.e., 0.1 to 100 nm. Nanoporous could thus mean everything from microporous to macroporous. 

Textural mesoporosity is a feature that is quite frequently found in materials consisting of particles with sizes on the nanometer scale. For such materials, the voids in between the particles form a quasi-pore system. The dimensions of the voids are in the nanometer range. However, the particles themselves are typically dense bodies without an intrinsic porosity. This type of material is quite frequently found in catalysis, e.g., oxidic catalyst supports, but will not be dealt with in the present chapter. Here, we will learn that some materials possess a structural porosity with pore sizes in the mesopore range (2 to 50 nm). The pore sizes of these materials are tunable and the pore size distribution of a given material is typically uniform and very narrow. The dimensions of the pores and the easy control of their pore sizes make these materials very promising candidates for catalytic applications. The present chapter will describe these rather novel classes of mesoporous silica and carbon materials, and discuss their structural and catalytic properties. 

Porous texture characterization of all the samples was performed by physical adsorption of N2 at 77K. and CO2 at 273K, using an automatic adsorption system (Autosorb-6, Quantachrome). The micropore volume, Vpp (N2), was determined by application of Dubinin-Radushkevich equation to the N2 adsorption isotherm at 77K up to P/Po< 0.1. The volume of narrow micropores, Vnpp (DR,C02>, (mean pore size lower than 0.7 nm) was calculated from CO2 adsorption at 273 K. 

The NiO phase could be reduced to metallic Ni by hydrogen treatment (723 K, 1 h). The crystallite size of Ni metal (estimated from XRD pattern of the reduced sample) is similar to that of the NiO in the unreduced sample (e.g., for 7B, the Ni metal crystallite size is 8.2 nm). The textural characterization studies reveal that for the samples prepared by coprecipitation + digestion and hydrothermal synthesis (methods B and C) the pore sizes are in the mesopore range (2.9 to 6.8 nm) (Table 11.2). 

This transition produces an isomorphous phase and the resulting y-alumina has the same morphology and texture as its boehmite precursor. With increasing temperature and time the mean pore diameter increases gradually and other phases appear (S-, 6-alumina). Due to the broad XRD lines, the distinction between y- and S-alumina cannot be made 6-alumina occurs at about 900°C while the conversion to the chemically very stable a-alumina phase takes place at T> 1000°C. Some typical results for alumina membranes synthesized without binders are given in Table 2.4. When PVA was used as a binder, thermogravimetric analysis showed that, provided the appropriate binder type was used, the binder could be effectively removed at T > 400°C. The ash residue is of the order of 0.01 wt.%. Mean pore size and... 

The classical Kelvin equation assumes that the surface tension can be defined and that the gas phase is ideal. This is accurate for mesopores, but fails if appUed to pores of narrow width. Stronger sohd-fluid attractive forces enhance adsorption in narrow pores. Simulation studies [86] suggest that the lower limit of pore sizes determined from classical thermodynamic analysis methods hes at about 15 nm. Correction of the Kelvin equation does lower this border to about 2 run, but finally also the texture of the fluid becomes so pronounced, that the concept of a smooth hquid-vapor interface cannot accurately be applied. Therefore, analysis based on the Kelvin equation is not applicable for micropores and different theories have to be applied for the different ranges of pore sizes. 

Soil Moisture Effect The effects of soil moisture content and soil texture and pore size distribution on kerosene conductivity were studied by Gerstl et al. (1994). Figure 12.13B shows the kerosene conductivity in sand, loam, and clay soil columns, as the initial moisture content varies from 0% (oven dried) to field capacity. 

Another coke formed in a FCC unit is occluded or residual coke. In a commercial unit this coke corresponds to coke formed on catalyst porosity and its content depends on textural properties of the catalyst (pore volume and pore size distribution) and the stripping system capacity in the reaction section. Finally on the FCC catalyst rests some high-molecular weight of nonvaporized hydrocarbons. These molecules do not vaporize or react at the reactor conditions and accumulate in the catalyst pores like a soft carbonaceous residue with high hydrogen content. 

The importance of aluminas is due to their availability in large quantities and in high purity presenting high thermal stability and surface areas (in the 199-259 mVg range and even more). Their pore volumes can be controlled during fabrication and bimodal pore size distributions can be achieved. However, besides these textural aspects, the surface chemical properties of aluminas play a major role, since these are involved in the formation and stabilization of catalytically active components supported on their surfaces. Despite the widespread interest in catalytic aluminas there is still only a limited understanding about the real nature of the alumina surface [44,89,99]. 

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