The effect of reduction procedure on catalyst properties, activity and products selectivity of ruthenium-promoted Co/?-Al2O3 catalyst in Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FTS) was investigated. Catalyst samples were reduced with different reduction gas compositions and passivated before being characterized by TPR and XRD techniques. Different activity and product selectivity analyses were also performed. These results showed that the catalyst dispersion, particle size, and the degree of reduction changed with different reduction gas compositions, which were resulted from the water partial pressures in reduction process that give varying degrees of interaction with the support. It has been suggested that the FTS activity of cobalt catalyst was directly dependent on the catalyst reducibility. A reduction gas with a molar ratio of H2/He = 1 was used to prevent the formation of Co-support compound during catalyst reduction.

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