Ethylene epoxidation catalysis

Having identified Cu as a potential additive to Ag for ethylene epoxidation catalysis, it is useful to examine the properties of Cu in Ag-Cu alloys more closely. The phase diagram of bulk Ag-Cu alloys shows that at almost all compositions, mixtures of Ag and Cu will phase separate into an alloy that is very rich in Ag and an alloy that is very rich in Cu.73 At 200°C, the Ag-rich phase is 99 at.% Ag and the Cu-rich phase contains <1 at.% Ag. This... 

Poisons can he used to preferentially block a non-favourable pathway. Such selective poisons are often called reaction modifiers. An example of such a system is ethylene epoxidation catalysis. Above a certain coverage of chlorine the ethylene combustion reaction is severely deactivated, whereas the effect on the selective route is less. As soon as the EDC is introduced... 

Wagner was first to propose the use of solid electrolytes to measure in situ the thermodynamic activity of oxygen on metal catalysts.17 This led to the technique of solid electrolyte potentiometry.18 Huggins, Mason and Giir were the first to use solid electrolyte cells to carry out electrocatalytic reactions such as NO decomposition.19,20 The use of solid electrolyte cells for chemical cogeneration , that is, for the simultaneous production of electrical power and industrial chemicals, was first demonstrated in 1980.21 The first non-Faradaic enhancement in heterogeneous catalysis was reported in 1981 for the case of ethylene epoxidation on Ag electrodes,2 3 but it was only... 

M. Stoukides, and C.G. Vayenas, Transient and steady-state vapor phase electrocatalytic ethylene epoxidation, ACS Symposium Series 178 ("Catalysis under transient conditions") A.T. Bell and L.L. Hegedus, Eds., pp. 181-202 (1982). 

Reactions between alkenes and 07 on MgO also lead to nonselect ive oxidation (21). One would hope to gain insight into the possible role of this ion in epoxidation catalysis, but rapid surface reactions, for example between ethylene oxide and MgO, make it difficult to obtain such information. The principal reaction products, CHi and CO2, are believed to be formed in a manner analogous to reactions 12-15. The initial hydrogen abstraction again is effected by the 07 ion. 

J. M. Berty, in Ethylene Epoxide Synthesis, ed. B. E. Leach, Applied Industrial Catalysis, Vol. 1, Academic Press (1983). 

This section describes in detail three topics in heterogeneous catalysis to which DFT calculations have recently been applied with great effect, the prediction of CO oxidation rates over RuO2(110), the prediction of ammonia synthesis rates by supported nanoparticles of Ru, and the DFT-based design of new selective catalysts for ethylene epoxidation. All three examples involve the careful application of DFT calculations and other appropriate theoretical methods to make quantitative predictions about the performance of heterogeneous catalysts under realistic operating conditions. 

Key Words Ethylene oxide, Ethylene, Epoxidation, Silver, Cl promotion, Cs promotion. Promotion, Selectivity, Oxametallacycle, Adsorption, Desorption, Chemisorption, Activation energy, Ag-O bond. Reaction mechanism, Oxidation, Cyclisation, Heterogeneous catalysis, Selective oxidation, Eletrophilic oxygen. Nucleophilic oxygen. Subsurface O atoms, Ag/a-A Oj catalyst. 2008 Elsevier B.V. 

SERS is important also in the study of catalysis. Here silver itself is of interest such as for the ethylene epoxidation reaction." Moskovits et showed the usefulness of SERS for the study... 

Lambert and co-workers (121-123, 125) have addressed this issue of further oxidation and other features of Cs promotion using model catalysts based on Cs/Ag(lll). Their results indicate that the simultaneous presence of Cs and CO2 lead to marked enhancements in selectivity (125). In contrast to Campbell s results, they report that Cs enhances the rate of epoxidation at low conversion (122). They also show that, although Ag(l 11) is active in the isomerization of the product (ethylene epoxide) to acetaldehyde, its activity for this side reaction can be suppressed by surface Cs addition (122, 123). Since this isomerization may lead to further oxidation of the epoxide, this may help to explain the enhancement in selectivity derived from Cs addition in industrial catalysis. 

R.A. van Santen, The Active Site of Promoted Ethylene Epoxidation Catalysts, Proc. 9th Internat. Congres on Catalysis, M.J. Phillips, M. Ternan, (eds.), Vol. 3, 1152 (1988)... 

A. Auroux and P. C. Gravelle, Comparative study of the bond energy of oxygen at the surface of supported silver catalysts and of the activity of these catalysis for ethylene epoxidation, Thermochimica Acta, vol. 47, no. 3, pp. 333—341, 1981. 

As we ve just seen nucleophilic ring opening of ethylene oxide yields 2 substituted derivatives of ethanol Those reactions involved nucleophilic attack on the carbon of the ring under neutral or basic conditions Other nucleophilic ring openings of epoxides like wise give 2 substituted derivatives of ethanol but either involve an acid as a reactant or occur under conditions of acid catalysis... 

An interesting alcoholysis of epoxides has been reported by Masaki and coworkers <96BCSJ195>, who examined the behavior of epoxides in the presence of a catalytic amount of the Tt-acid tetracyanoethylene (TCNE, 85) in alcoholic media. Ring-opening is very facile under these conditions, typically proceeding via normal C-2 attack, as exemplified by styrene oxide (86). Certain epoxy ethers (e.g., 89) undergo C-1 attack due to anchimeric assistance. Analysis of the reaction mixtures revealed the presence of captodative ethylenes (e.g., 85) formed in situ, whieh were shown to be aetive in eatalyzing the reaction. The proposed mode of catalysis is represented by the intermediate 87. The affinity of these captodative olefins for... 

The search for a new epoxidation method that would be appropriate for organic synthesis should also, preferably, opt for a catalytic process. Industry has shown the way. It resorts to catalysis for epoxidations of olefins into key intermediates, such as ethylene oxide and propylene oxide. The former is prepared from ethylene and dioxygen with silver oxide supported on alumina as the catalyst, at 270°C (15-16). The latter is prepared from propylene and an alkyl hydroperoxide, with homogeneous catalysis by molybdenum comp e ts( 17) or better (with respect both to conversion and to selectivity) with an heterogeneous Ti(IV) catalyst (18), Mixtures of ethylene and propylene can be epoxidized too (19) by ten-butylhydroperoxide (20) (hereafter referred to as TBHP). 

N-pyrrolidino-l-cyclohexene, 432 reaction with A-2-thiazoline-5-one, 432 Enzymatic catalysis, in brommation, 77, 79 Enzyme activity, 152 Epoxides, see Ethylene oxide EPR, 83, 101... 

Metalloporphyrins catalyze the autoxidation of olefins, and with cyclohexene at least, the reaction to ketone, alcohol, and epoxide products goes via a hydroperoxide intermediate (129,130). Porphyrins of Fe(II) and Co(II), the known 02 carriers, can be used, but those of Co(III) seem most effective and no induction periods are observed then (130). ESR data suggest an intermediate cation radical of cyclohexene formed via interaction of the olefin with the Co(III) porphyrin this then implies possible catalysis via olefin activation rather than 02 activation. A Mn(II) porphyrin has been shown to complex with tetracyanoethylene with charge transfer to the substrate (131), and we have shown that a Ru(II) porphyrin complexes with ethylene (8). Metalloporphyrins remain as attractive catalysts via such substrate activation, and epoxidation of squalene with no concomitant allylic oxidation has been noted and is thought to proceed via such a mechanism (130). Phthalocyanine complexes also have been used to catalyze autoxidation reactions (69). 

Oxidation is extremely important both from a scientific and a practical point of view. Without oxidation life would not exist. In the chemical industry, too, oxidation is probably the most important process. A major example is the combustion of fossil fuels. This process is usually uncatalyzed, but sophisticated catalytic processes do exist. Examples in the inorganic industry are the oxidation of sulphur dioxide and ammonia in the manufacture of sulphuric acid and nitric acid, respectively. In the petrochemical industry many catalytic synthesis processes are carried out, for example the production of ethylene and propene epoxide, phthalic acid anhydride. An example which has recently also become important is the catalytic combustion of hydrocarbons in flue gases. Table 5.2 gives a list of examples of oxidation catalysis in industry [93]. 

In industry many selective oxidations are carried out in a homogeneously catalyzed process. Heterogeneous catalysts are also applied in a number of processes, e.g. total combustion for emission control, oxidative coupling of methane, the synthesis of maleic acid from butanes, the epoxidation of ethylene. Here we focus upon heterogeneous catalysis and of the many examples we have selected one. We will illustrate the characteristics of catalytic oxidation on the basis of the epoxidation of ethylene. It has been chosen because it illustrates well the underlying chemistry in many selective oxidation processes. 

On the basis of theoretical studies by Bach and co-workers,17 it was found that the nucleophilic 71-bond of the alkene attacks the 0-0 cr-bond in an Sn2 fashion with displacement of a neutral carboxylic acid. There are, however, some mechanistic anomalies. For example, a protonated peracid should be a much more effective oxygen transfer agent over its neutral counterpart, but experiments have shown only modest rate enhancements for acid catalysed epoxidation. Early attempts to effect acid catalysis in alkene epoxidation where relatively weak acids such as benzoic acid were employed proved unsuccessful.18 The picture is further complicated by contradictory data concerning the influence of addition of acids on epoxidation rates.19 Trichloroacetic acid catalyses the rate of epoxidation of stilbene with perbenzoic acid, but retards the rate of a double bond containing an ester constituent such as ethyl crotonate.20 Recent work has shown that a seven-fold increase in the rate of epoxidation of Z-cyclooctene with m-chloroperbenzoic acid is observed upon addition of the catalyst trifluoroacetic acid.21 Kinetic and theoretical studies suggest that the rate increase is due to complexation of the peroxy acid with the undissociated acid catalyst (HA) rather than protonation of the peroxy acid. Ab initio calculations have shown that the free energy of ethylene with peroxy-formic acid is lowered by about 3 kcal mol-1 upon complexation with the catalyst.21... 

In early proposals the species responsible for epoxidation was identified as the adsorbed molecular oxygen, Ag 02(ads)> while combustion was attributed to monoatomic Ag O(ads) (Equations 14-16). The oxidation step envisages the transfer of one atom of molecularly adsorbed oxygen to the double bond, while the other remains adsorbed on silver. The consumption of the latter by the total oxidation of ethylene restores the site vacancies necessary for the continuation of catalysis. Up to a maximum of six oxygen atoms are required for the combustion of one ethylene molecule. Thus, the combination of the reactions (Equation 14) and (Equation 15) predicts that the maximum attainable selectivity in the epoxidation of ethylene is 6/7, i.e., 85.7% (Equation 16). A lower selectivity should normally be expected because some monoatomic oxygen independently formed by dissociative adsorption (Equation 13) raises the level of ethylene combustion above that predicted by Equation 16. 

Lanthanide catalysis was again effective in ring-opening reactions of cyclic epoxides (eq 8). Finally, MAO-activated l-RuCL provides block copolymers of ethylene and hex-l-ene. ... 

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