International Journal of Scientific Research and Engineering Development

This work was focused on the development and characterization of clay catalyst from Ngbo clay. The raw clay was crushed, refined, dried, and grinded before activation to produce acid activated clay (AAC), base activated clay (BAC), thermal activated clay (TAC), zinc chloride activated clay (ZAC) and pillared clay (PLC) catalysts respectively. The samples were characterized using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry (AAS), X-Ray Flourescence (XRF), Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and X-Ray Diffraction (XRD). The AAS result indicates that the raw Ngbo clay has high concentration of Aluminium and low concentration of lead. The results of the XRF analysis on the Ngbo clay and activated Ngbo clays indicate a high content of silicon and aluminium oxides compared to other oxides. The bands at 3697 and 3628cm−1 in FTIR results are assigned to the stretching vibration of hydroxyl groups in the clay structure, which indicates that Ngbo activated clay by acid or alkaline treatments, even under strong conditions and thermal treatment below 500 ℃, does not change due to its low reactivity. The SEM images of all Ngbo activated clay show retention of kaolinite structure but with noticeably small aggregate particles in between the silica-alumina plate on higher magnification, an indication of impurities on the beneficiated kaolin. The halloysite phase detected in the raw clay SEM image was not in the activated clay SEM image,The X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) of the raw clay sample showed that the physical properties of raw clay are kaolinite clay with a high aluminium to silicon ratio, which is a good characteristic of clay for the production of catalysts and synthetic zeolites. The catalysts produced could be applied in the esterification of carboxylic acids with alcohols and in the production of synthetic zeolites, to avoid the drawbacks of corrosion, loss of catalyst and environmental problems.