Supported gold (Au) nanocatalysts have attracted extensive interests in the past decades because of their unique catalytic properties for a number of key chemical reactions, especially in (selective) oxidations. The activation of O 2 on Au nanocatalysts is crucial and remains a challenge because only small Au nanoparticles (NPs) can effectively activate O 2 . This severely limits their practical application because Au NPs inevitably sinter into larger ones during reaction due to their low Taman temperature. Here we construct a Au-SiO 2 interface by depositing thin SiO 2 layer onto Au/TiO 2 and calcination at high temperatures and demonstrate that the interface can be not only highly sintering resistant but also extremely active for O 2 activation. This work provides insights into the catalysis of Au nanocatalysts and paves a way for the design and development of highly active supported Au catalysts with excellent thermal stability.

Chemical injection has been used to combat reservoir sweeping and water-control problems in the last two decades with different degrees of success. Many of the methods face the challenges of chemical durability, penetration depth, rock-fluid compatibility, and economical justification. Polymer microsphere injection is a new method developed recently to address these challenges in controlling waterflood conformance to enhance recovery efficiency. Made by emulsion synthetic technique the polymer microsphere expands at contact with reservoir water resulting in plugging of high permeability pore throat deep into the formation to divert the water flow path. The laboratory experiments showed an improvement of recovery factor by 14 to 16%. This paper presents the first field test in an offshore environment of a heavy oil reservoir Q in Bohai Bay in China. Q oilfield is a heterogeneous heavy oil reservoir suffering from fast water breakthrough with poor recovery. The polymer microsphere was injected into an eleven-well pilot. The injection pressure increased following injection of microsphere solution. Multiple fall-off tests were performed to monitor the plugging of flow channels at different times. The time taken to reach the reservoir pressure in the fall-off test increased with flooding time for four months demonstrating an effective channel plugging. Most of surrounding producers showed responses to microsphere injection in both pressure and oil production. The incremental recovery benefit to the test cost is estimated to be 4:1 to 6:1. The encouraging pilot test demonstrated the potential of polymer microsphere flooding to combat reservoir conformance challenge. This test needed simple equipments which were easy to be operated in the offshore platform environment. Further polymer microsphere flooding tests are in plan in China Bohai Bay area.

Green technology innovation is an effective way through which to achieve carbon neutrality and sustainable development. Based on provincial panel data of 30 provinces in China from 2005 to 2018, this work examines the tripartite relationship among green technology innovation, resource misallocation, and carbon emission performance by constructing panel regression models and a dynamic threshold panel model. The research results show that green technology innovation significantly improves carbon emission performance. Further analysis shows that both capital and labour misallocation have a negative impact on carbon emission performance and hinder the contribution of green technology innovation to the improvement of carbon emission performance. The regression results show that there is a threshold effect of green technology innovation on carbon emission performance: as the degree of resource misallocation increases, the positive impact of green technology innovation on carbon emission performance gradually decreases. This study provides an important reference for policy-makers in implementing policies to improve carbon emission performance. Policy-makers should continue to promote the level of green technology innovation and improve the efficiency of labour and capital allocation.