Perlite templated Y zeolite assembly and its potential as an efficient catalytic cracking catalyst

Monolayer Y zeolite crystal morphology was obtained by hydrothermal zeolitization of expanded perlite, perlite functions as template and the only aluminum source. Y zeolite crystals with size of 200-300 nm are growing on surface of perlite. The resultant composition NaY/perlite shows microporous surface area of 538 m(2)/g in contrast to 0 m(2)/g for expanded perlite, and it has a remarkable lower bulk density characteristic compared to usual NaY zeolite. Furthermore, the morphology of NaY/perlite is unchanged after steaming and heat treatment. The lattice collapse temperature of NaY/perlite is 64 K higher than NaY. The USY/perlite zeolite prepared from NaY/perlite shows similar monolayer dispersion morphology as NaY/perlite. It was shaped by spray drying to microsphere catalyst, catalytic cracking evaluation of heavy oil showed a significantly improvement of gasoline yield compared to the reference, it is attributed to efficient diffusion of reactant and desired product which is benefited from small zeolite crystal and high porosity features of the catalyst. (C) 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.