ABSTRACT
In light of the recent COVID-19 pandemic, the demand for hydrogen peroxide has increased significantly due to its widespread use in disinfectant formulations. The present study aims to develop an efficient nanohybrid material as catalyst support for the successful hydrogenation of ethylanthraquinone for the production of hydrogen peroxide. Co-precipitation and wet impregnation methods were used to prepare nanohybrid Zr–Al–La supported Pd catalyst (Pd/Zr–Al–La). The high surface area (146.56 m2/g) of Zr–Al–La makes it suitable to use as support and causes to lower the mass transfer resistance and dispersion of active metal. XRF, BET, FTIR, and TGA were used to characterize the developed catalyst. The catalytic activity of the developed catalyst was studied using a high-pressure autoclave reactor to obtain a notable yield of H2O2 as 93.8% at 75 °C, 0.3 MPa, and 0.5 g of catalyst dose, a significant enhancement over the traditional Pd catalyst with Al2O3 support (63%) with the loss of active quinone compound. The mass transfer limitation of the reaction is high using only a Pd catalyst. The calculated mass transfer resistance of the reaction over Pd/Zr–Al–La catalyst was found to be moderate with a diffusion coefficient of the reactant (H2) as 0.0133 × 10−6 m2/s at 75 °C. It was also verified and confirmed with the Thiele modulus (calculated as 0.0314), no mass transfer resistance. The effectiveness factor (η s ) was found to be 1.0, indicating the negligible mass transfer resistance in the hydrogenation reaction using Pd/Zr–Al–La catalyst. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of International Journal of Chemical Reactor Engineering is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)