Investigation of Salt and precipitating agent effect on the specific surface area and compressive strength of alumina catalyst support

Nowadays, catalyst supports are extensively used to decrease the costs and increase the contact surface area in chemical reactions. Specific surface area, compressive strength, pore volume and pore size are some of the most important characteristics of a catalyst support. In this work, Sol-gel and peptization methods were applied to produce alumina catalyst support. Also the roles of aluminum salts and precipitating agents on the specific surface area and compressive strength of alumina catalyst support were investigated. In addition, various additives and common methods in the increasing surface area, compressive strength and adjusting the porosity and pore size are used in this study. The results show that using caustic soda as precipitating agent and aluminum chloride salt yields catalyst supports with the best compressive strength. Also, using aluminum nitrate and ammonia as precipitating agent produced alumina catalyst support with the highest specific surface area.