Highly Active and Selective Nano H‑ZSM‑5 Catalyst with Short Channels along b‑Axis for Glycerol Dehydration to Acrolein

• Published in: Industrial & engineering chemistry research 2019-07, Vol.58 (28), p.12611-12622
• Main Authors: Qureshi, Babar Ali, Lan, Xiaocheng, Arslan, Muhammad Tahir, Wang, Tiefeng
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0888-5885; 1520-5045
• DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.9b01882

For the sustainability of the biodiesel industry, the selective glycerol dehydration to valuable acrolein using zeolite catalysts is a very important economic-sustainable route. For glycerol dehydration, the conventional micropore morphology of zeolites exhibits diffusion resistance to guest molecules through the longer channels and inhibits access to active acid sites, which leads to the formation of coke and reduces the stability and selectivity of the catalyst. In this work, we synthesized a highly crystalline nano H-ZSM-5 catalyst with short channels along the b-axis at different Si/Al ratios to investigate the effect of channel length and acidity on glycerol dehydration to acrolein. The H-ZSM-5 (Si/Al = 75) catalyst having a nano straight channel along the b-axis and medium acidity gave much higher conversion, stability, and selectivity to acrolein due to sufficient accessibility to active acid sites and rapid diffusion through the nanolength channels as compared to a commercial catalyst with longer channels.