NH₃‑SCR over V−W/TiO₂ Investigated by Operando X‑ray Absorption and Emission Spectroscopy

V−W/TiO2-based catalysts, which are used for the removal of NOx from the exhaust of diesel engines and stationary sources via selective catalytic reduction with NH3 (NH3-SCR), were studied by operando X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) and emerging photon-in/photon-out techniques. In order to minimize the influence of highly X-ray absorbing tungsten and the fluorescence of titanium, we used a high-energyresolution fluorescence setup that is able to separate efficiently the V Kβ1,3 emission lines and additionally allows to record valence-to-core (vtc) X-ray emission lines. High-energy resolution fluorescence-detected XAS (HERFD-XAS) and vtc X-ray emission spectroscopy (vtc-XES) proved to be the only way to perform an operando V K edge X-ray spectroscopic study on industrially relevant V−W/TiO2 catalysts so far. The V−W/TiO2 and V/TiO2 samples synthesized by incipient wetness impregnation and grafting exhibited high activity toward NH3-SCR. Raman spectroscopy showed that they mainly contained highly dispersed, isolated, and polymeric V-oxo species. HERFD-XAS and XES identified redox cycling of vanadium species between V4+ and V5+. With respect to most of the potential NH3 adsorption complexes, density functional theory calculations further showed that vtc-XES is more limited than surface-sensitive techniques such as infrared spectroscopy; hence, a combination of X-ray techniques with IR or similar spectroscopies is required to unequivocally identify the mechanism of NH3-SCR over vanadia-based catalysts.