Abstract:

The oxidative dehydrogenation of light alkanes to light alkenes is one of the potentially important catalytic processes for the effective utilization of light alkanes. However, high temperatures were required to initiate the reactions on heterogeneous catalysts reported by other authors in the literature^[1,2]. In recent years we reported a series of novel nanocrystalline rare earth orthovanadates synthesized by the peroxyl and nitrate methods for oxidative dehydrogenation of propane at low temperatures^[3,4]. In this paper the synthesis of a series of novel nanocrystalline rare earth orthovanadates (LnVO₄, Ln=Y, La, Ce, Pr, Nd, Sm Eu, Gd, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm, Yb) by the citrate method is reported, together with the structural characterization and excellent performances of the catalysts for oxidative dehydrogenation of light alkanes.