Abstract:
Ever increasing energy demand has forced the scientists to find out new solutions to
generate energy. Among other forms of energy liquid fuels holds the utmost importance
due to their widespread use in energy and transportation sectors. The focus of masses
towards environmental concerns of conventional sources has also molded the research to
find out relatively clean resources of energy. Fischer Tropsch is one of such technique
that can not only generate liquid fuels from various sources but also reduces their
adverse environmental impacts. Fischer Tropsch Synthesis is one of such efforts that
generate synthetic hydrocarbons from various sources like coal, biomass, natural gas and
environmental carbon dioxide. The Fischer Tropsch Synthesis uses syngas to generate a
mixture of hydrocarbons, at high temperature and pressure, in the presence of a catalyst.
This study focuses on developing a cobalt based catalyst for Fischer Tropsch Synthesis
(FTS) process having magnesium aluminium hydrotalcites as support. In this study
catalysts are prepared using two different methods: coprecipitation and hydrothermal
method using different precipitating agents. First of all, hydrotalcite supported cobalt
catalyst are prepared by co-precipitation method using both sodium and potassium based
precipitating agent. Secondly two catalysts are prepared by hydrothermal method and
using both sodium and potassium based precipitating agents separately. The qualitative
and quantitative analyses of all the prepared samples are done using various
characterization techniques. XRD and SEM were performed to gather information about
the structure and morphology of the catalyst. EDS was used for elemental analysis of the
samples. BET and TGA are two techniques that give information about the properties of
catalyst like surface area and thermal stability. FTIR was performed to check the purity
of samples. The samples were tested for FTS process in a micro reactor especially to
check the C5+ selectivity. The product obtained from FTS reactor was analyzed using
GC-MS. The results showed very high C5+ selectivity for catalyst prepared by
hydrothermal method as compared to catalyst prepared by coprecipitation method.
