Rare earth catalytic materials

The term ‘catalyst’ has been used since the early 19th century, but it has been widely known for nearly 30 years, roughly dating back to the 1970s when air pollution and other issues became a problem. Before that, it played a very important role in the depths of chemical plants that people could not observe, quietly but continuously for decades. It is a huge pillar of the chemical industry, and with the discovery of new catalysts, the large-scale chemical industry has not yet developed until the related materials industry. For example, the discovery and use of iron catalysts laid the foundation for modern chemical industry, while the discovery of titanium based catalysts paved the way for the petrochemical and polymer synthesis industries. In fact, the earliest application of rare earth elements also began with catalysts. In 1885, Austrian C.A.V. Welsbach impregnated a nitric acid solution containing 99% ThO2 and 1% CeO2 on asbestos to make a catalyst, which was used in the manufacturing industry of steam lampshades.

Later, with the development of industrial technology and the deepening of research on rare earths, it was found that due to the good synergistic effect between rare earths and other metal catalytic components, rare earth catalytic materials made from them not only have good catalytic performance, but also have good anti poisoning performance and high stability. They are more abundant in resources, cheaper in price, and more stable in performance than precious metals, and have become a new force in the catalytic field. At present, rare earth catalysts have been widely used in various fields such as petroleum cracking, chemical industry, automotive exhaust purification, and natural gas catalytic combustion. The use of rare earth in the field of catalytic materials accounts for a considerable share. The United States consumes the largest proportion of rare earth in catalysis, and China also consumes a large amount in this area.

Rare earth catalytic materials continue to be widely used in traditional fields such as petroleum and chemical engineering. With the enhancement of national environmental awareness, especially with the approaching of the Beijing 2008 Olympics and Shanghai 2010 World Expo, the demand and application of rare earth catalytic materials in environmental protection, such as automotive exhaust purification, natural gas catalytic combustion, catering industry oil fume purification, industrial exhaust gas purification, and the elimination of volatile organic waste gas, will definitely increase significantly.