Direct hydrodeoxygenation of raw woody biomass into liquid alkanes

Being the only sustainable source of organic carbon, biomass is playing an ever-increasingly important role in our energy landscape. The conversion of renewable lignocellulosic biomass into liquid fuels is particularly attractive but extremely challenging due to the inertness and complexity of ligno...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature communications 2016-03, Vol.7 (1), p.11162-11162, Article 11162
Main Authors: Xia, Qineng, Chen, Zongjia, Shao, Yi, Gong, Xueqing, Wang, Haifeng, Liu, Xiaohui, Parker, Stewart F., Han, Xue, Yang, Sihai, Wang, Yanqin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
119/118
639/638/263/406/77
639/638/403
Alkanes - chemical synthesis
Biofuels
Biomass
Catalysis
Cyclohexanes - chemistry
Humanities and Social Sciences
Lignin - chemistry
multidisciplinary
Niobium - chemistry
Oxidation-Reduction
Platinum - chemistry
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Wood - chemistry
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Summary:Being the only sustainable source of organic carbon, biomass is playing an ever-increasingly important role in our energy landscape. The conversion of renewable lignocellulosic biomass into liquid fuels is particularly attractive but extremely challenging due to the inertness and complexity of lignocellulose. Here we describe the direct hydrodeoxygenation of raw woods into liquid alkanes with mass yields up to 28.1 wt% over a multifunctional Pt/NbOPO 4 catalyst in cyclohexane. The superior performance of this catalyst allows simultaneous conversion of cellulose, hemicellulose and, more significantly, lignin fractions in the wood sawdust into hexane, pentane and alkylcyclohexanes, respectively. Investigation on the molecular mechanism reveals that a synergistic effect between Pt, NbO x species and acidic sites promotes this highly efficient hydrodeoxygenation of bulk lignocellulose. No chemical pretreatment of the raw woody biomass or separation is required for this one-pot process, which opens a general and energy-efficient route for converting raw lignocellulose into valuable alkanes. The conversion of renewable lignocellulosic biomass into liquid fuels is attractive but extremely challenging due to the inertness and complexity of lignocellulose. Here, the authors describe the direct hydrodeoxygenation of raw woods into liquid alkanes over a multifunctional Pt/NbOPO 4 catalyst.
ISSN:2041-1723
2041-1723
DOI:10.1038/ncomms11162