Pilot scale study of CoFeNi nanocatalyst for CO hydrogenation in FischerTropsch synthesis

In this work, a CoFeNi catalyst was prepared and the effect of a range of operational variables such as gas hourly space velocity (GHSV), calcination temperature, calcination time and agent on its catalytic performance for greenfuels production was investigated. By application of different characterization techniques such as XRD, BET, TGA/DSC, and SEM, it was found that these parameters have great effects on the structure, porosity, morphology and physicchemical properties of this catalyst. The optimum conditions were found for the samples which were calcined at 550 ℃ in air for 6 hours, and operated at 300 ℃ and 4800h lt;sup gt;1 lt;/sup gt;as the reaction temperature and GHSV respectively. Results also revealed that any increase in the calcination temperature promotes the product shifting towards heavier hydrocarbons (more C lt;sub gt;5+ lt;/sub gt; production). Calcination in air atmosphere was more effective than calcination in N lt;sub gt;2 lt;/sub gt; atmosphere.