last updated 12/21/09

It has been known for several years now that supported gold is active for shift at very low temperatures (ca. 150 to 160 °C), as long as the gold particle size is in the nanometer range. There do not appear to be rate expressions available for these catalysts, so we have initiated a study of the kinetics as a function of gas environment. The catalyst activity changes considerably with time on stream, so of necessity we are simultaneously examining this aspect of the kinetics. We plan initially to generate power-law type rate expressions. Once we are able to characterize the catalysts more thoroughly at various stages of their lifetime, we will attempt to generate mechanistic kinetic models for the reaction and for the deactivation of the catalyst.

This project was partially funded by the ACS-PRF.

Papers Resulting from this Project

“A Rate Expression for Water-Gas Shift over a Gold/Ferrochrome Catalyst,” G. N. Vajani, S. L. Ng and C. R. F. Lund, Ind. Eng. Chem. Res., 50 (18), 10493-10499 (2011). [more info]

Presentations Resulting from this Project

“Deactivation of Gold-Ferrochrome Very Low Temperature Water-Gas Shift Catalysts,” AIChE Annual Meeting, Salt Lake City, UT, November 7-12, 2010.

“Fe₃O₄-based High and Low Temperature Shift Catalysts,” Pittsburgh-Cleveland Catalysis Society, Pittsburgh, PA, October 9, 2009.

“Kinetic Study of Water-Gas Shift over Au-Ferrochrome Catalysts,” Annual AIChE Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, November 17, 2008.

Dissertations Resulting from this Project

Gaurav N. Vajani, “Low Temperature Water-Gas Shift Reaction over Gold-Ferrochrome Catalysts,” Ph. D. Dissertation, University at Buffalo, SUNY, Dept. of Chemical Engineering (2011). [more info]