Dehydrocyclization of Alkanes Over Zeolite-Supported Metal Catalysts: Monofunctional or Bifunctional Route

The direct catalytic conversion of alkanes into aromatics has found potentially important industrial applications. Initially only alkanes with 6 and more carbon atoms in the chain were concerned. Supported platinum catalysts were found active for the aromatization of alkanes; the drawbacks of these catalysts were their deactivation with time on stream and the existence of simultaneous parallel reactions. Much discussion has been published on the aromatization of C₆₊ alkanes. A bifunctional mechanism which involves both the metal and the acid sites of the support and a monofunctional mechanism involving only the metallic sites operate over, respectively, Pt supported on acidic support and Pt supported on nonacidic support. In the present review the mechanisms proposed for the aromatization of alkanes are described. Over monofunctional Pt catalysts two possible mechanisms prevail: 1,6 ring closure on the Pt surface involving primary and secondary C-H bond rupture, followed by dehydrogenation of the cycloalkanes into aromatics (1,5 ring closure to a lesser extent also contributes to aromatic production); or dehydrogenation of the alkanes into olefins, dienes, and trienes followed by thermal ring closure. Zeolites were found most suitable as support for preparing catalysts more active and more selective in the alkane aromatization. In addition catalysts based on noble metals supported on zeolite appeared more resistant against deactivation by coke. In this review the aromatization of hexane, heptane, and octane over Pt-zeolite catalysts is discussed in detail. Comparisons between different zeolite structures and different dehydrogenation sites are given. In particular a critical analysis of the results and interpretation concerning Pt-KL catalysts strongly suggests that the exceptional high selectivity towards aromatization of n-hexane exhibited by Pt-KL could not be explained by only the nest or constraint effect exerted by the channel dimension and morphology, not by only the terminal cracking properties, not by only the partial electron transfer from the zeolite support to the Pt particles, and not by only the Pt particle size. Zeolite structure also affects the aromatic product distribution, in particular when the alkane contains more than 7 carbon atoms. It is shown how Pt on medium-pore zeolites such as In-ZSM-5, silicalites will favor the aromatization of C₈ alkane isomers into ethylbenzene-styrene with respect to other C₈ aromatics. Aromatization of light alkanes, C₂-C₅, requires the increase of the hydrocarbon chain length up to 6 carbon atoms and higher, followed by cyclization reaction. Recently new processes to convert C₂-C₅ alkanes into aromatics have been disclosed, M2-forming from Mobil, Cyclar from BP-UOP, and Aroforming from IFP-Saluted. In general these processes use bifunctional catalysts possessing a dehydrogenating and an acid function. The catalysts consist of a metal ion or metal oxide supported on a microporous acid solid. In this review we analyze the results concerning mainly platinum supported on pentasil-type zeolite. It is shown that althoug Pt has better dehydrogenating properties as compared with gallium and zinc, the efficiency of catalysts based on Pt-ZSM-5 for light alkane aromatization is less because undersirable reactions such as hydrogenolysis and ethene (olefins) hydrogenation occur on the platinum surface, resulting in the production of unreactive alkanes, CH₂, C₂H₆. These drawbacks could be partially suppressed by alloying Pt and by increasing the reaction temperature.     

Selective Oxidation of Butanes. Toward Green/Sustainable Chemistry

The importance of selective oxidation for the progress of green/sustainable chemistry is pointed out and the state of the art of heterogeneous selective oxidation of alkanes described, taking for examples the selective oxidations to form oxygenated products (1) of isobutane catalyzed by heteropoly-based mixed oxides and (2) of n-butane to maleic anhydride catalyzed by vanadium phosphorous mixed oxides. In addition, efforts necessary to bring about breakthroughs in this field are discussed.     

SOLUBILITY OF ANTHRACENE IN BINARY ALKANE + 2-METHOXYETHYL ETHER SOLVENT MIXTURES

Experimental solubilities are reported for anthracene dissolved in six binary mixtures containing 2-methoxyethyl ether with n-hexane, n-heptane, n-octane, cyclohexane, methyl-cyclohexane and 2,2,4-trimethylpentane at 298.15 K. Results of these measurements are used to test a mathematical representation based upon the combined Nearly Ideal Binary Solvent (NIBS)/Redlich-Kister model. For the six systems studied, the model was found to provide an accurate mathematical representation of the experimental results, with an overall average absolute deviation between measured and calculated values being on the order of 0.4 per cent or less.     

Comparative study of pure component adsorption of linear alkanes in zeolites MFI, BEA and MOR

Grand canonical Monte Carlo (GCMC) simulations and configurational-bias Monte Carlo simulations (CBMC) have been performed to compute and compare the pure component adsorption isotherms of C1–C7 linear alkanes in MFI, BEA, and MOR zeolites at 300 K. It is demonstrated that generally, the surfaces of the three zeolites available for adsorption are not energetically homogeneous; adsorption of the alkanes in the three zeolites can be divided into two steps, in the first step of which molecules are adsorbed in the strong sites and on the later of which on the weak sites; all isotherms obtained can be well described by the dual-site Langmuir equation, though the saturation loadings and the adsorption strengths are different for the three different topologic zeolites. A quantitative analysis of the isotherms shows that the Henry’s law constants in the three zeolites obey a similar linear relation to the number of carbon atoms of the alkanes.     

Alkyl Chain Growth on a Transition Metal Center: How Does Iron Compare to Ruthenium and Osmium?

Industrial Fischer-Tropsch processes involve the synthesis of hydrocarbons usually on metal surface catalysts. On the other hand, very few homogeneous catalysts are known to perform a Fischer-Tropsch style of reaction. In recent work, we established the catalytic properties of a diruthenium-platinum carbene complex, [(CpRu)₂(μ²-H)(μ²-NHCH₃)(μ³-C)PtCH₃(P(CH₃)₃)₂](CO)_n⁺ with n = 0, 2 and Cp = η⁵-C₅(CH₃)₅, and showed it to react efficiently by initial hydrogen atom transfer followed by methyl transfer to form an alkyl chain on the Ru-center. In particular, the catalytic efficiency was shown to increase after the addition of two CO molecules. As such, this system could be viewed as a potential homogeneous Fischer-Tropsch catalyst. Herein, we have engineered the catalytic center of the catalyst and investigated the reactivity of trimetal carbene complexes of the same type using iron, ruthenium and osmium at the central metal scaffold. The work shows that the reactivity should increase from diosmium to diruthenium to diiron; however, a non-linear trend is observed due to multiple factors contributing to the individual barrier heights. We identified all individual components of these reaction steps in detail and established the difference in reactivity of the various complexes.     

直链烷烃脱氢催化剂载体制备新工艺

研究了以Na Al O2-Al2(SO4)3为原料制备直链烷烃脱氢催化剂载体的工艺,考察p H交替变化对直链烷烃脱氢催化剂载体孔结构的影响,采用XRD、TEM、DTG、DTA、氮吸附-脱附仪和压汞仪等对载体的晶相、粒子形态、结晶水含量、比表面积及孔分布进行表征。结果表明,p H交替变化使拟薄水铝石晶粒尺寸增加,结晶水含量降低,制备出孔容≥1.2 m L·g-1、比表面积≤150 m2·g-1和堆积密度≤0.32 g·m L-1的具有双孔分布的直链烷烃脱氢催化剂载体γ型氧化铝。酸性条件下,大量细小无定形氧化铝迅速溶解,有利于更多细小拟薄水铝石颗粒形成;碱性条件下,这些迅速溶解的无定型氧化铝附着在拟薄水铝石颗粒上,使拟薄水铝石一次粒子逐步长大,结晶度增加。