Enhanced Fischer-Tropsch synthesis performances of Fe/h-BN catalysts by Cu and Mn

A series of Fe/h-BN catalysts promoted with Cu or Mn were prepared for Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FTS). The physicochemical properties, crystal structures and morphologies of the catalysts were characterized by N2 physisorption, FT-IR, TPR, XPS, XRD, MES and TEM. It is found that iron oxide nanoparticles are highly dispersed on h-BN matrix due to the anchoring effect of surface defects and the accommodation of porous structures of h-BN. The characterization results indicate that strong interaction between iron oxide and h-BN is present on un-promoted catalyst, which endows the h-BN supported iron catalyst with stable properties under FTS conditions but severely retards reduction of the catalyst. The addition of Cu to Fe/h-BN can to some extent overcome the strong interaction by introducing more sites for dissociating H2. It is observed that Cu promoter can increase the reduction or carburization degree and thus enhance the FTS activity. The addition of Mn to Fe/h-BN can weaken the strong interaction by altering the electron structure of iron species. And the electron-rich Fe species are responsible for easy reduction and the enhanced FTS performance. Besides, a higher activity can be realized by co-adding Cu and Mn to the Fe/h-BN catalyst. These results suggest that the synergistic effect of Mn and Cu can largely improve the performance of Fe/h-BN catalyst without impairing the stability of the catalyst. The present study paves a way to tailor the performances of FTS catalysts with h-BN as support.