Facile synthesis of SSZ-16 nanoaggregates with excellent performance in NH3-SCR reaction

d6r units were proved to be crucial for the synthesis of SSZ-16 zeolite with AFX topology, and FAU zeolite owning plenty of d6r units was chosen as the essential raw material for constructing AFX frameworks. In this work, SSZ-16 zeolite was directly synthesized using colloidal silica and sodium aluminate as the raw materials in short crystallization time of 5 h. The corresponding crystallization process were carefully investigated by various characterizations, demonstrating that the key to this success was the formation of d6r units built up by a large amount of s4r units which were formed with the assistance of the appropriate organic structure directing agent (OSDA) and seeds in the synthetic media. Interestingly, the products of C-SSZ-16 zeolites presented spherical shapes consisted of relatively small particles with size range from 30 to 50 nm. Moreover, after ion-exchanged with Cu ions, the Cu-C-SSZ-16 products showed excellent performance in the selective catalytic reduction of NOx with NH3 (NH3-SCR) and better hydrothermal stability than conventional Cu-SSZ-16-con samples due to slightly higher Si/Al ratio of the Cu-C-SSZ-16. Therefore, remarkable catalytic performance and the use of low-cost raw materials as well as short period of synthesis time make AFX zeolites as potential applicants in NH3-SCR field, from an industrial viewpoint. [Display omitted] •SSZ-16 zeolite was synthesized directly using colloidal silica and sodium aluminate as raw materials.•Plenty of d6r units were built up by a large amount of s4r units with the assistance of the OSDA and seeds.•The Cu-based SSZ-16 product shows excellent activity and high hydrothermal stability in the NH3-SCR reaction.