Synthesis and CO hydrogenation activity of ruthenium zeolite A

Ruthenium zeolite A was synthesized by several techniques from either RuCl/sub 3/ or (Ru(NH/sub 3/)/sub 5/Cl/sub 2/. An example of the synthesis procedure with RuCl/sub 3/ is described. First, zeolite A is synthesized in the presence of RuCl/sub 3/ by simple addition of the ruthenium salt to a standard zeolite A synthesis gel. The resulting ruthenium-zeolite A was crystallized in approximately 2 hours under autogeneous pressure at 95/sup 0/C. Next, a portion of the ruthenium-zeolite A was added to another zeolite A synthesis gel to serve as a ''carrier'' of ruthenium and as a ''seed'' for the synthesis. Ruthenium-zeolite A was recovered from the ''seeded'' synthesis and exchanged with CaCl/sub 2/ for the two reasons: (1) to remove exchangeable ruthenium from the surface of the zeolite (intrazeolitic ruthenium will be too large to exchange out of the ..cap alpha..-cage), and (2) to place the zeolite A in its most stable form (the calcium form of zeolite A is more stable than NaA to attack by water at elevated temperatures).