In this study, natural Algerian kaolin was used as a support and impregnated with nickel at different loading amounts (2 wt.%, 5 wt.%, and 7 wt.%) in order to prepare a supported catalyst. The wet impregnation technique was used in this preparation; nickel oxide (NiO) was the active phase precursor of the catalyst, and the catalysts were designated as follows: 2%, 5%, and 7% Ni/kaolin. These catalysts were put to the test in catalytic wet peroxide oxidation (CWPO) for degrading the organic contaminant malachite green dye (MG). Analytical techniques such as FTIR spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, BET, and X-fluorescence were used to examine the structure, morphology, and chemical composition of the support and the produced catalysts. Several parameters, including temperature, catalytic dose, metal loading, hydrogen peroxide volume, and kinetic model were systematically investigated. The combination of improved parameters resulted in a significant increase in the catalytic activity, achieving a high removal rate of MG dye of 98.87%.

In this work, a non-toxic protonated kaolin clay exchanged with protons, was successfully applied as a solid acid catalyst for the polymerization of tetrahydrofuran (poly(THF)) at room temperature in the presence of acetic anhydride. Prior to using the kaolin as a catalyst, it was treated with HCl (0.1 M) and characterized using various analytical techniques. The amounts of catalyst and reaction time on the conversion of THF were investigated. Characterizations of nuclear magnetic Resonance of proton (1H-NMR), Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray Diffraction (XRD), Optical Microscopy (OM), and Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC) techniques were used to examine the resulting polymer. X-ray characterization and DSC data indicated that the obtained poly(THF) is a highly crystalline substance. The results showed that protonated kaolin (kaolin–H+) has a high catalytic activity for the polymerization of THF with a conversion rate of 50.02% after 20 hours.