Preparation of Pt / Al2O3 for preheating system on autothermal reformer for fuel cell / Qusyairi Ali

Project paper (Bachelor of Chemical Engineering) --- Universiti Malaysia Pahang - 2008

Preheating system for autothermal reformers (ATR) is needed to ensure shorter start-up times due to the heat supplied to the catalyst bed by catalytic combustion of the fuel. Nobel metals such as platinum, have been used as catalysts for the catalytic oxidation of hydrogen and show higher activity. However, the platinum catalyst will involve a very high cost because of the platinum price it self. Accordingly, the preparation of platinum catalyst to an alumina support has been investigated in this study. The sample Pt/Al2O catalyst was prepared with different platinum weight loading which is 1wt% and 3wt% by impregnation process. hexachloroplatinic acid (H2PtCl63) and Gama-alumina (γ-Al2O) solutions were used in this preparation. The hydrazine NH43 added to reduce the chlorine ion from Platinum during preparation. Procedures and condition of impregnation, drying and calcination was discussed. Catalyst characteristic was analysed using Fourier Transform Infra-Red (FTIR) spectroscopy and Scanning Electron Micrograph (SEM). Comparison with literature FTIR data indicated that platinum was dispersed into γ-Al2O. SEM micrograph show that crystallites structure of platinum was formed at γ-Al32O surface. In addition, both samples were tested through catalytic combustion of hydrogen at fixedair and fuel ratio. The result shows that the 3wt% of Pt/ γ-Al2O33 performance is better than 1wt% of Pt/ γ-Al2O with the highest temperature of 362o3C. This temperature is enough to supply the heat to the Autothermal reformer catalyst for it to function efficiently. Author