Role of Promoters on the Acrolein Ammoxidation Performances of BiMoO.

Ammoxidation of acrolein to acrylonitrile was studied using multicomponent (MC) BiMoO x catalysts in the presence of ammonia and oxygen. The MC catalysts containing bivalent and trivalent metal promoters were found to be highly active and selective to acrylonitrile. The corresponding MC catalysts were characterized by X-ray diffraction, nitrogen physisorption, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, ICP-MS and UV-visible diffuse reflectance spectroscopy. It was observed that, among the bivalent cations, the catalysts containing both Co-Ni showed superior performances due to the presence of the metastable β-CoNiMoO phase. The presence of a trivalent cation, and especially of iron, promoted the formation of both the γ-BiMoO active phase and the active β-phase of bivalent metal molybdate. Further, optimization of the reaction conditions enabled the achievement of a 59 % acrylonitrile yield. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]