Cyclohexane, oxidative dehydrogenation catalysts

Dutch State Mines (Stamicarbon). Vapor-phase, catalytic hydrogenation of phenol to cyclohexanone over palladium on alumina, Hcensed by Stamicarbon, the engineering subsidiary of DSM, gives a 95% yield at high conversion plus an additional 3% by dehydrogenation of coproduct cyclohexanol over a copper catalyst. Cyclohexane oxidation, an alternative route to cyclohexanone, is used in the United States and in Asia by DSM. A cyclohexane vapor-cloud explosion occurred in 1975 at a co-owned DSM plant in Flixborough, UK (12) the plant was rebuilt but later closed. In addition to the conventional Raschig process for hydroxylamine, DSM has developed a hydroxylamine phosphate—oxime (HPO) process for cyclohexanone oxime no by-product ammonium sulfate is produced. Catalytic ammonia oxidation is followed by absorption of NO in a buffered aqueous phosphoric acid... 

There are fewer studies of oxidative dehydrogenation of butane, and even fewer for cyclohexane than ethane or propane. The performance of the better catalysts in these two reactions are summarized in Table VII and Fig. 5. Because of the larger number of secondary carbon atoms in these molecules, they are more reactive with gaseous oxygen than the smaller alkanes. In ex-... 

The oxidative dehydrogenation of cyclohexane to benzene has been studied more extensively. Transition metal ion-exchanged forms of zeolite Y have been shown (34-39) to be particularly active catalysts for this reaction. Although the platinum metal ions exhibit the highest activity, CuY was found to be the most selective for benzene formation (38, 39). 

The controlled oxidation of alkanes into alcohols also attracts attention from an industrial point of view. Copper-based catalysts containing Tp ligands have been employed as catalysts for this reaction that led to a very interesting as well as unprecedented transformation with copper. Thus, when cyclohexane was reacted with in the presence of these catalysts, cyclohexane was partially converted into cyclohexanol and cyclohexanone, as expected. However, a certain amount of cyclohexane underwent dehydrogenation affording cyclohexene, in the first example of a copper-mediated alkane dehydrogenation process. Part of the cyclohexene was epoxidized in the reaction... 

By far the largest outlet for benzene (approx. 60%) is styrene (phenyl-ethene), produced by the reaction of benzene with ethylene a variety of liquid and gas phase processes, with mineral or Lewis acid catalysts, are used. The ethylbenzene is then dehydrogenated to styrene at 600-650°C over iron or other metal oxide catalysts in over 90% selectivity. Co-production with propylene oxide (section 12.8.2) also requires ethylbenzene, but a route involving the cyclodimerization of 1,3-butadiene to 4-vinyl-(ethenyl-) cyclohexene, for (oxidative) dehydrogenation to styrene, is being developed by both DSM (in Holland) and Dow. 60-70% of all styrene is used for homopolymers, the remainder for co-polymer resins. Other major uses of benzene are cumene (20%, see phenol), cyclohexane (13%) and nitrobenzene (5%). Major outlets for toluene (over 2 5 Mt per annum) are for solvent use and conversion to dinitrotoluene. 

The phenol process based on the oxidation of cyclohexane has been operated for a short time by Monsanto in Australia and is of less importance. In this process, a mixture of cyclohexanone and cyclohexanol is dehydrogenated to phenol at 400 °C, using platinum/activated carbon or nickel/cobalt catalysts. The degree of conversion can reach 90 5%. The crude phenol is refined by distillation. A particular disadvantage of this process lies in the difficulty in refining the crude oxidation mixture from cyclohexane oxidation. 

The length scale plays a vital role in heterogeneous catalysis to control the structure, active phase and overall framework of the catalyst system. In the CMR, catalysis by nano-scale materials will improve the physico-chemical properties of the catalytic membrane. A uniform nanostructured catalytic membrane was prepared using AAO and atomic layer deposition techniques and tested in oxidative dehydrogenation of cyclohexane. Nanostructured CMs have excellent properties, such as uniform pores, contact time control, uniform diffusion paths and active site isolation (no sintering), compared... 

Reactions. The most important commercial reaction of cyclohexane is its oxidation (ia Hquid phase) with air ia the presence of soluble cobalt catalyst or boric acid to produce cyclohexanol and cyclohexanone (see Hydrocarbon oxidation Cyclohexanoland cyclohexanone). Cyclohexanol is dehydrogenated with 2iac or copper catalysts to cyclohexanone which is used to manufacture caprolactam (qv). 

Cyclohexane can be dehydrogenated to benzene very cleanly under the same conditions with the same copper-silver catalyst, as can 2-propanol to acetone. These catalysts almost certainly act by virtue of an oxide layer on the metal. 

Purely parallel reactions are e.g. competitive reactions which are frequently carried out purposefully, with the aim of estimating relative reactivities of reactants these will be discussed elsewhere (Section IV.E). Several kinetic studies have been made of noncompetitive parallel reactions. The examples may be parallel formation of benzene and methylcyclo-pentane by simultaneous dehydrogenation and isomerization of cyclohexane on rhenium-paladium or on platinum catalysts on suitable supports (88, 89), parallel formation of mesityl oxide, acetone, and phorone from diacetone alcohol on an acidic ion exchanger (41), disproportionation of amines on alumina, accompanied by olefin-forming elimination (20), dehydrogenation of butane coupled with hydrogenation of ethylene or propylene on a chromia-alumina catalyst (24), or parallel formation of ethyl-, methylethyl-, and vinylethylbenzene from diethylbenzene on faujasite (89a). 

Halcon (1) Halcon International (later The Halcon SD Group) designed many organic chemical processes, but is perhaps best known for its process for making phenol from cyclohexane. Cyclohexane is first oxidized to cyclohexanol, using air as the oxidant and boric acid as the catalyst, and this is then dehydrogenated to phenol. Invented in 1961 by S. N. Fox and J. W. Colton, it was operated by Monsanto in Australia for several years. 

Catalytic reforming has become the most important process for the preparation of aromatics. The two major transformations that lead to aromatics are dehydrogenation of cyclohexanes and dehydrocyclization of alkanes. Additionally, isomerization of other cycloalkanes followed by dehydrogenation (dehydroisomerization) also contributes to aromatic formation. The catalysts that are able to perform these reactions are metal oxides (molybdena, chromia, alumina), noble metals, and zeolites. 

Array microreactors and mass spectrometry were used to find the best composition of Pt-Pd-Ir for the dehydrogenation of cyclohexane to benzene.210,211 A catalyst library of 37 binary alloys composed of transition metals, Cu, Zn, and Ti or Si, was screened by IR thermography in the hydrogenation of 1-hexyne, and the oxidation of isooctane and toluene.212... 

In a more recent study of the dehydrogenation of cyclohexane to benzene over a chromium oxide catalyst at 450°C., Balandin and coworkers (Dl) concluded that benzene was formed by two routes. One of these, the so-called consecutive route, involves cyclohexene as a gas phase intermediate, while the other proceeds by a direct route in which intermediate products are not formed in the gas phase. It was concluded that the latter route played a larger role in the reaction than did the former. These conclusions were derived from experiments on mixtures of cyclohexane and Cl4-labeled cyclohexene, which made it possible to evaluate the individual rates Wi, BY, Wt, and Wz in the reaction scheme... 

The compensation trend present in data reported by Shannon et al. (285) for the isomerization of n-butenes over a number of different oxide catalysts is given in Table V, P (omitting from the calculation the point for MnO, which shows a marked deviation). Dehydrogenation of cyclohexane over oxides (286) exhibited similar behavior the calculated line is given in Table V, Q. Hydrocarbon exchange over alumina (287) also gave a slight compensation trend, for which e = 0.132 and ae = 0.024. 

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