Mesoporous silica–supported copper catalysts for dehydrogenation of biomass-derived 1,4-butanediol to gamma butyrolactone in a continuous process at atmospheric pressure

Vapor-Phase Oxidant-Free Dehydrogenation of 2,3- and 1,4-Butanediol over Cu/SiO2 Catalyst Prepared by Crown-Ether-Assisted Impregnation

“…Even though increasing the N 2 flow rate increased the equilibrium yield of AC, the equilibrium inhibited the full conversion of 2,3-BDO. The dehydrogenation of 1,4-BDO to GBL was performed to investigate the activity of the 12C4-xCu/SiO 2 catalyst for 1,4-BDO dehydrogenation, which is an irreversible reaction (Scheme 1b) [17,44,45]. Figure 6a shows the time course of the catalytic performance of none-and 12C4-10Cu/SiO 2 catalysts in the dehydrogenation of 1,4-BDO at 260 • C and a W/F of 0.080 h. Both catalysts maintained their 1,4-BDO conversion and GBL selectivity for 10 h; nevertheless, 12C4-10Cu/SiO 2 catalyst gave significantly higher catalytic activity than none-10Cu/SiO 2 catalyst.…”

“…The utilization of 12C4 as an organic additive was proven to generate a Cu catalyst with the largest SA Cu . Several Cu catalysts are highly active for the dehydrogenation of 1,4-BDO to GBL at 240 or 250 • C and a W/F of 0.5 h or higher [17,18,41,[43][44][45]; nevertheless, the 12C4-10Cu/SiO 2 catalyst in our work gave a comparable catalytic performance at a shorter W/F of 0.27 h at 260 • C. It is also worth noting that the GBL productivity of 12C4-10Cu/SiO 2 was significantly higher than the GBL productivity of the reported Cu catalysts. In summary, catalytic activity in the dehydrogenation was improved by preparing a Cu/SiO 2 catalyst using organic additives.…”

“…Nevertheless, several issues, such as a high reaction temperature, low productivity, and long contact time, still need to be addressed. Numerous reports have also shown that Cubased catalysts are active in the dehydrogenation of 1,4-BDO to GBL (Scheme 1b) [17,[41][42][43][44][45]. However, the reported Cu catalysts still suffer from low GBL productivity.…”

Literature review: state-of-the-art hydrogen storage technologies and Liquid Organic Hydrogen Carrier (LOHC) development

“…In addition, continuous reduction of Cu by H 2 was observed on Cu/SiO 2 , rationalizing its excellent catalytic performance stability (95.8% conversion and 99% respectively) over 400 h on stream [464]. While SiO 2 was less selective than basic oxides, mesoporous SBA-15 presented weak acid sites that were beneficial for the tandem O-H bond cleavage but not potent enough to induce major dehydration, reaching 100% conversion and 98% selectivity [465].…”