Gas phase decarbonylation of diethyl oxalate to diethyl carbonate over alkali-containing catalyst

✍ Scribed by CuiYing Hao; Shengping Wang; Xinbin Ma

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2009
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 445 KB
• Volume: 306
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1381-1169
• DOI: 10.1016/j.molcata.2009.02.038

✦ Synopsis

A detailed alkali catalytic preparation of diethyl carbonate (DEC) from diethyl oxalate (DEO) via gaseous phase decarbonylation was investigated in the paper. Evaluation results showed that 6 wt% (based on potassium) K 2 CO 3 /AC (activated carbon) catalyst exhibited a relatively high catalytic activity. 54.3% conversion of DEO, 27.8% selectivity to DEC and 300.0 g/(L h) space time yield of DEC were obtained at 513 K and the gas hourly space velocity 1000 h -1 . A series of characterization approaches were performed to explore the reasons for the decreasing catalytic activity. By means of XRD analysis, it can be concluded that the K 2 CO 3 with high dispersion on the catalyst surface is favorable for the production of DEC, while the formation of K 2 CO 3 crystallization results in the decrease of the catalytic activities. The KHCO 3 crystallization detected on the catalyst surface after the reaction also leads to the degressive active properties. Moreover, the results of BET, XPS and ICP-OES indicated that the specific surface area and the potassium content of catalysts are closely related with the catalytic activity.