Chemical interaction of Ce-Fe mixed oxides was investigated in methane selective oxidation via methane temperature programmed reduction and methane isothermal reaction tests over Ce-Fe oxygen carriers. In methane temperature programmed reduction test, Ce-Fe oxide behaved complete oxidation at the lower temperature and selective oxidation at higher temperatures. Ce-Fe mixed oxides with the Fe content in the range of 0.1~）.5 was able to produce syngas with high selectivity in high-temperature range （800-900 ~C）, and a higher Fe amount over 0.5 seemed to depress the CO formation. In isothermal reaction, complete oxidation oc- curred at beginning following with selective oxidation later. Ce~_xFexO2~ oxygen carriers （x5_0.5） were proved to be suitable for the selective oxidation of methane. Ce-Fe mixed oxides had the well-pleasing reducibility with high oxygen releasing rate and CO selec- tivity due to the interaction between Ce and Fe species. Strong chemical interaction of Ce-Fe mixed oxides originated from both Fe＊ activated CeO2 and Ce3＋ activated iron oxides （FeOm）, and those chemical interaction greatly enhanced the oxygen mobility and selectivity.
Pr0.7Zr0.3O2-δ solid solution was prepared by co-precipitation method and used as an oxygen carrier in the selective oxidation of methane to syngas(methane/air redox process). The evolution on the physicochemical properties of Pr0.7Zr0.3O2-δ during the redox process was studied by means of X-ray diffraction(XRD), H2 temperature-programmed reduction(H2-TPR), O2temperature-programmed desorption(O2-TPD), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller(BET) surface area measurement and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy(XPS) technologies. The results indicated that Pr0.7Zr0.3O2-δ solid solution showed the high activity for the methane conversion to syngas with a high CO selectivity in the range of 83.5%-88.1%. Though Pr-Zr solid solution possessed high thermal stability, lattice oxygen was obviously reduced for the recycled sample due to decreased surface oxygen which promoted oxygen vacancies. The increased oxygen vacancies seemed to enhance the oxygen transfer ability in the redox process and provided sufficient oxygen for the methane selective oxidation, resulting in a satisfactory activity. The problem of hot pot was avoided by comparing fresh, aged and recycle sample in the reaction.
