Catalysis In The Chemical Industry

Catalysis plays an important role in the chemical industry and industrial research in order to fulfill the economic, political and environmental demands. When using a catalyst it is possible to replace a polluting chemical reaction with a more environmental friendly alternative. The most common examples of catalyst used in the heterogeneous catalysis in industry are iron, nickel, zeolite, platinum, rhodium and vanadium (V) oxide on silica while the catalyst used in homogeneous catalysis are sulfuric acid and hydrogen fluoride. The homogeneous catalyst are less frequently used in industry than heterogeneous catalyst because in order to complete the reaction, they have to be separated from the products and the process can be very expensive.

Therefore, the use of expensive platinum metal catalyst in the technologies for reducing of pollutant in order to control and remove the NO, CO and hydrocarbons in emission of stationary and mobile combustion. Hence, it can replace the polluting substances to more environmental friendly substances. The catalytic converters is used to change the poisonous molecules like carbon monoxide and various nitrogen oxides in car exhausts into more harmless molecules like carbon dioxide and nitrogen. It reduces the toxicity of emission from the internal combustion engines. They are fitted in the motor vehicle exhaust system. The thermal nitrogen oxides formation can be reduced very significantly by using platinum metal as the heterogeneous catalyst. There are two methods of catalytic control of nitrogen oxides can be achieved which are known as non-selective catalytic reduction (NSCR) and selective catalytic reduction (SCR). NSCR uses hydrogen, carbon monoxide or hydrocarbons as the reducing agent while SCR employs

The most effective catalyst for methanol production are Cu, Ni, Pd, and Pt while the most common metals used for support are Al and Si. In the production of gas, it is usually manufactured via steam reforming of natural gas for production of hydrogen. Besides that, the production of ammonia is crucial for the world’s agricultural industry to manufacture of fertilizers. The manufacture of ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen takes place in two main stages which are the production of hydrogen and the most common process used in ammonia industry via the Haber process. The hydrogen produced from natural gas involved the manufacture of synthesis gas which contains mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen via steam reforming and then removal of the carbon monoxide to produce mixture of hydrogen and nitrogen using iron catalyst or nickel catalyst at 600K. This process is known as methanation. Then, it will undergo the Haber process to complete the production of ammonia and the produced ammonia can be used further in production of nitric acid via the Ostwald