CO reforming of methane to syngas over multi-walled carbon nanotube supported Ni-Ce nanoparticles: effect of different synthesis methods.

Several multi-walled carbon nanotubes supported Ni-Ce catalysts were synthesized, and their performance in carbon dioxide reforming of methane (CDRM) for syngas production was evaluated. The attachment of Ni-Ce nanoparticles to the functionalized carbon nanotube (fCNT) support was carried out using four synthesis routes, i.e., impregnation (I), sol-gel (S), co-precipitation (C), and hydrothermal (H) methods. Results indicated that synthesis method influences the properties of the NiCe/fCNT catalysts in terms of homogeneity of metal dispersion, size of crystallites, and metal-support interaction. The activity of the catalysts followed the order of NiCe/fCNT(H) > NiCe/fCNT(S) > NiCe/fCNT(C) > NiCe/fCNT(I). The NiCe/fCNT(H) catalyst exhibited the highest catalytic activity with CH and CO conversions of 92 and 96%, respectively, and resulted in syngas product with consistent H/CO ratio of 0.91 at reaction temperature of 800 °C without notable deactivation up to 30 h of reaction. Moreover, the growth of carbon on the spent catalyst was only 2% with deposition rate of 4.08 mg/g·h; this was plausibly due to the well-dispersed distribution of nanoparticles on fCNT surface and abundant presence of oxygenated groups on the catalyst surface.