Performance of Pd catalyst supported on trimetallic nanohybrid Zr–Al–La in hydrogenation of ethylanthraquinone

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 m 2 /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 H 2 O 2 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 Al 2 O 3 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 (H 2 ) as 0.0133 × 10 −6 m 2 /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.