Blocking of Zeolite Pore by Loading Ni-Pt Nanoparticles for Maximization of Isomerization Selectivity

Zeolite HY is wet impregnated with Ni (0.1, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5 wt%), Pt (0.1 wt%) and reduced in presence of hydrogen to form nanosized particles of Ni and Pt. All the catalysts were characterized by XRD, TEM, ESCA, NH 3 -TPD, Pyridine adsorbed FT-IR and BET. Characterization results confirm that the Ni and Pt fractions effectively rehabilitated the physio-chemical properties of the zeolite HY catalysts. Further, all the reduced catalyst were screened with hydroisomerization of m-xylene at LHSV = 2.0 h-1 in the temperature range 250-400 ºC in steps of 50 ºC in hydrogen atmosphere (20 ml/g). The addition of Ni to Pt catalyst increases hydroisomerization conversion, as well as maximizes p-xylene selectivity by restricting the pore size. The increasing trend in activity continues up to 0.3 wt% of Ni and 0.1 wt% Pt addition over zeolite HY. The increasing addition of Ni increases the total number of active metallic sites to exposed, which increases the metallic sites/acid sites ratio towards the optimum value for these reactions by better balance of synergic effect for stable activity. The rate of deactivation is pronounced on monometallic catalysts. The results confirm the threshold Ni addition is highly suitable for hydroisomerization reaction for product selectivity over Ni-Pt bimetallic/support catalysts.