STTR Phase II: Scale-Up of An Innovative Spray Pyrolysis Process for Producing Pyrochlore Catalysts

该商业创新研究第二阶段项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是将Pyrochem催化剂公司（PCC）的催化剂材料商业化。 这些催化剂材料的独特之处在于催化活性金属原子分散在刚性晶体基质中。 这赋予了无与伦比的热稳定性，即使在超过1000°C的温度下。 传统的催化剂通常需要更高的贵金属负载量（高达20倍）才能实现与本项目中开发的材料相同的活性，并且在高温下，这些活性金属会聚集成大的团簇，降低其性能和催化剂的寿命。 该项目开发的系列催化剂的设计旨在最佳利用和保护所有贵金属。 这包括抗硫中毒和在恶劣条件下操作时的碳积累。 这使得这些材料成为高温工艺的理想选择，例如用于制氢的蒸汽甲烷重整、用于合成气生产的自热重整、氧传输膜（OTM）中的合成气生成以及汽车催化转化器中的废气氧化。 第二阶段STTR计划的目标是在第一阶段目标的成功基础上，开发一种低成本和连续的催化剂制造方法，用于生产烧绿石粉末，烧绿石粉末是拟定催化剂产品的基础。 该方法对于生产其他类型的混合金属氧化物如钙钛矿和萤石可以同样有效。在第二阶段，PCC将根据第一阶段中展示的概念验证的设计元素，建造和测试一个扩大的生产平台。 新装置将设计用于生产专有烧绿石粉末，其生产率将比第一阶段装置的生产率提高一百倍。 第二阶段的技术工作还检查了一系列催化剂合成参数，如氧化剂气体浓度/组成、生产装置中的温度分布、前体停留时间、合成溶液化学以及优化传热和传质。 通过一个子奖项，从该过程中产生的粉末将由国家能源技术实验室，摩根敦，西弗吉尼亚州的活性进行表征和测试。 该项目的总体目标是开发高通量/高产率的生产工艺，生产用于商业销售的高性能催化剂。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Business Innovation Research Phase II project is to commercialize Pyrochem Catalyst Company's (PCC) catalyst materials. These catalyst materials are unique in that the catalytically active metal is atomically dispersed in a rigid crystalline matrix. This imparts unparalleled thermal stability, even at temperatures in excess of 1000°C. Conventional catalysts typically require much higher precious metal loadings (as much as 20 times) to achieve the same activity as the materials developed in this project and at high temperatures those active metals can agglomerate into large clusters reducing their performance and the lifetime of the catalyst. The series of catalysts developed in this project are designed in a way that all precious metal is optimally utilized and protected. This includes resistance from sulfur poisoning and the accumulation of carbon when operating under severe conditions. This makes these materials ideal for high temperature processes such as steam methane reforming for hydrogen generation, autothermal reforming for syngas production, syngas generation in oxygen transport membranes (OTM), and exhaust oxidation in automotive catalytic convertors. The objectives of this Phase II STTR program are to build on the success of the Phase I objectives that developed a low cost and continuous catalyst manufacturing method for producing the pyrochlore powders that are the basis for the proposed catalyst product. The method may be equally effective for producing other types of mixed metal oxides like perovskites and fluorites. In Phase II, PCC will construct and test a scaled-up production platform, following the design elements of the proof of concept demonstrated in Phase I. The new unit will be designed to manufacture proprietary pyrochlore powders at a rate with a hundred-fold increase over production rates of the Phase I unit. The Phase II technical efforts also examine a range of catalyst synthesis parameters like oxidant gas concentration/composition, temperature distribution in the production unit, precursor residence times, synthesis solution chemistry, and optimizing heat and mass transport. Through a subaward, powders produced from the process will be characterized and tested for activity by the National Energy Technology Labs, Morgantown, WV. The overall goal of this project is the development of a high throughput / high yield manufacturing process that produces high performance catalysts for commercial sale.