Abstract. The support CeO 2 was prepared by thermal decomposition method, and the Cu-Co-Ce-O catalysts were synthesized via impregnation method. The prepared catalysts were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) techniques, and their catalytic properties for low-temperature CO oxidation were evaluated by using a microreactor-GC system. The results showed that the Co/Ce atomic ratio has great effect on the activities of catalysts, and the catalyst with Co/Ce = 1 has the highest catalytic activity for CO total oxidation at 90 o C.
IntroductionCarbon monoxide, which is emitted from many industrial and transportation activities, is one of the major air pollutants that are harmful to human health and the environment. In order to control the toxic emission, catalytic oxidation of CO is an efficient way. Recently, lots of catalysts have been investigated, in which precious metal catalysts such as Pd/SnO 2 , Au/MnO x , Au/α-Fe 2 O 3 , Pt/SnO 2 and Au/SnO 2 have been demonstrated to be very effective [1][2][3]. However, their extensive adoption is discouraged by their high cost and limited availability. Much attention has thus recently been paid to base metal as catalysts, for both their excellent performances in CO oxidation and low cost.Cerium dioxide is of interest for its applications such as three-way catalysts for automotive exhaust gas treatment. CeO 2 supported precious metal and CuO catalysts have been used for carbon monoxide oxidation [4][5][6]. Recently, Ce-containing mixed oxides, such as CeO 2 -ZrO 2 , CeO 2 -CoO, and CeO 2 -TiO 2 have been proposed as oxidation catalysts [7][8][9][10]. However, the doping of ceria with other elements did not always enhance the activity of CuO/CeO 2 catalysts in catalytic oxidation. Wu et al. [10] prepared CuO/Ce 1-x Ti x O 2 by a sol-gel impregnation method and studied its catalytic activity for the preferential oxidation of CO in H 2 -rich streams. The catalyst with a composition of CuO/Ce 0.8 Ti 0.2 O 2 exhibited the highest activity. Our previous studies [7] found that incorporating zirconium into CeO 2 could improve the oxygen storage capacity, redox properties and thermal resistance of the resulting mixed oxides. The mesoporous CuO/Ce 0.8 Zr 0.2 O 2 nanocatalysts exhibited the highest catalytic activity for low temperature CO oxidation (total oxidation of CO at 90