Thermal stability of Cu-K-V catalyst for diesel soot combustion

This paper reports a study on the thermal stability of a Cu-K-V catalyst, which showed particular promise for low temperature combustion of diesel particulate. Prolonged treatments were performed at high temperatures (400-1000°C) for periods up to 15 days under different gaseous atmospheres. The effect of such treatments on the catalyst composition was investigated by means of weight-decrease measurements and composition analysis (atomic absorption, X-ray diffraction, etc.), whereas the catalyst activity towards soot combustion was determined via thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential thermal analysis (DTA). The apparent activation energy of the soot combustion process was calculated for a collection of catalyst samples, thermally treated according to several different representative conditions, by the Ozawa method on the basis of the DTA results. Some of the thermal treatments (especially those performed at high temperatures: 900-1000°C) resulted in a reduction of the catalyst activity as shown by the increase of both the activation energy and the soot ignition temperature, as a consequence of the volatilisation of at least some of the active compounds of the catalyst itself (KCl, CuCl 2, etc.). Any periodic thermal regeneration of a catalvtically-activated trap for diesel emissions (leading to such high temperatures) performed to eliminate any accumulated soot, has thus to be avoided by designing a trap capable of burning out all the soot produced at the diesel exhaust temperatures (< 400°C).