Investigation of Fe2O3@SiO2 catalysts synthesized via various methods for the catalytic gasification of pinewood

Adding appropriate catalysts during biomass gasification can effectively increase gas production and reduce tar yield, thereby improving the biomass gasification process. Different catalyst preparation methods affect the surface structure and gasification performance of the catalysts. In this study, Fe2O3@SiO2 catalysts were prepared using the physical coating method (R-Fe2O3@SiO2) and the hydrolysis method of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) (T-Fe2O3@SiO2).The catalysts were characterized using XRD, BET, and FTIR. The T-Fe2O3@SiO2catalyst exhibited a more diverse pore size distribution between 1 and 20 nm, as well as surface hydroxyl groups. The morphology was observed using TEM, and both catalysts exhibited a core-shell structure. Characterization using H2-TPR and NH3-TPD revealed that T-Fe2O3@SiO2 displayed stronger adsorption peaks, indicating a higher number of sites.High-temperature steam catalytic gasification experiments were conducted in a self-assembled fixed-bed gasification furnace, analyzing the gas-phase and liquid-phase products of pinewood under different preparation methods. When using T-Fe2O3@SiO2 for the gasification experiment, the volumetric fraction of H2 was 38.45 %, and the yield was 20.58 mmol/g, which represents a 16.13 % increase in H2 gas yield compared to the gasification experiment using R-Fe2O3@SiO2. Compared to the pure pinewood gasification experiment, the H2 gas yield increased by 54.23 %. When T-Fe2O3@SiO2 was used as the catalyst and reused for five cycles, the H2 yield decreased by only 9.1 %, effectively suppressing catalyst deactivation.