Further development of selective physisorption for measuring catalyst surface area

Abstract Platinum supported on silica is used as a model supported catalyst for the purpose of demonstrating that the selective physisortion method yields the fractional catalyst surface area of supported catalysts, inclucing metal compounds catalysts for which the method is primarily intended. The selective physisorption results with nitrous oxide as adsorbate are compared with hydrogen chemisorption results for this purpose. Experimental and theoretical refinements of the method developed earlier in our laboratory are presented that allow rather accurate determination of the catalyst surface area. The refinements also make the method effctive even when the catalyst covers a small portion of the total surface area. Because of the nature of physisorption, the method should be applicable to any supported catalyst including metal compounds catalysts, provided a suitable adsorbate is used. Adsorbates other than nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide which are suitable for selective physisorption, are suggested.