Non-oxidative dehydrogenation of propane is one of the most promising technologies for propene production in terms of environmental impact and sustainability. The purpose of the present study was to develop environmentally friendly and low-cost alternatives to currently applied Pt- or CrO_x-based catalysts. Rutile TiO₂-based catalysts with supported ZnO_x and ZrO_x species were established to show promising performance under industrially relevant conditions. The amount of propene produced within 3 h on propane stream at 550 °C over the optimized catalyst with 2 wt% Zn and 5.6 wt% Zr is close to that obtained over commercial-like K–CrO_x/Al₂O₃ and the state-of-the-art Cu/YZrO_x catalyst. The selectivity to propene over our catalyst was about 95% at a propane conversion of about 23%. The kind of active sites and the effect of ZrO₂ addition on catalyst performance and physicochemical properties were elucidated owing to the application of complementary characterisation techniques such as XRD, N₂ physisorption, HRTEM, EDX, XPS, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, NH₃-TPD, CO-TPR, Raman and O₂-TPO. ZnO_x clusters with 1–3 Zn atoms were concluded to be the active sites. ZrO₂ enhances their intrinsic activity and inhibits the formation of the inactive rhombohedral ZnTiO₃ phase.

中文翻译：

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ZnO和ZrO2的TiO2负载型丙烷的非氧化脱氢催化剂：机理分析和应用潜力

就环境影响和可持续性而言，丙烷的非氧化脱氢是丙烯生产中最有希望的技术之一。本研究的目的是开发目前应用的基于Pt或CrO _x的催化剂的环保且低成本的替代品。建立具有负载的ZnO _x和ZrO _x物种的金红石TiO ₂基催化剂在工业相关条件下显示出令人鼓舞的性能。在具有2 wt％Zn和5.6 wt％Zr的优化催化剂上，在550°C的丙烷流中3小时内产生的丙烯量接近于商业化的K–CrO _x / Al ₂ O _{3所获得的量}和最先进的Cu / YZrO _x催化剂。在约23％的丙烷转化率下，在我们的催化剂上对丙烯的选择性为约95％。由于应用了互补的表征技术，如XRD，N ₂物理吸附，HRTEM，EDX，XPS，X射线吸收光谱，NH ₃，阐明了活性部位的种类以及ZrO _2的添加对催化剂性能和理化性质的影响。-TPD，CO-TPR，拉曼和O ₂ -TPO。结论是具有1-3个Zn原子的ZnO _x簇是活性位点。ZrO ₂增强了其固有活性，并抑制了惰性菱形ZnTiO ₃相的形成。