Active Ni-Titanate Nanostructures for Dry Reforming of Methane

One of the main causes of climate change is the increased concentration of greenhouse gases from anthropogenic sources. Therefore, the search for processes that provide mitigation of these gases is imperative and very important. Dry reforming of methane (DRM) is a process that converts CO₂ and CH₄ in pure syngas. Thus, this study aims to evaluate the influence of the calcination temperature (500 and 700 °C) in the titanate nanotubes (TNT) structure. The calcination at 700 °C led to a new morphology in the form of titanate nanorods (TNR). TNT and TNR nanostructures were modified with Ni and used as catalysts in the DRM reaction. The CO₂ and CH₄ conversions were around 60 and 48%, respectively, when using Ni-TNT500 at 700 °C, while values around 85 and 70%, respectively, were obtained using TNR in the same reactional condition. Both catalysts presented values of H₂/CO ratio near 1.

Keywords:
titanate nanotube; titanate nanorods; nickel; DRM; syngas synthesis