Catalytic dehydration of ethanol with different loading of WO3 supported on activated carbon and clay catalysts

Abstract

The catalytic ethanol dehydration is a reaction, which increases the value of ethanol by producing diethyl ether (DEE) or ethylene. The catalysts which have been used for this reaction were tungsten catalysts supported on activated carbon and montmorillonite catalysts, by varying W loading between 2-13.5 wt.%. The catalysts were tested in a fixed bed microreactor under atmospheric pressure and temperature range of 200 to 400˚C. The results showed that Low tungsten on catalyst decreased the total surface acidity. Besides, additional tungsten loading increased the total surface acidity. Low tungsten loading enhanced ethanol dehydrogenation to acetaldehyde. The high content of tungsten in catalysts was able to promote dehydration reaction of ethanol, whereas diethyl ether did not occur on activated carbon catalysts except 13.5wt% of tungsten on activated carbon catalyst. The 2 wt% of tungsten over activated carbon catalyst from TPI performed the highest reaction rate of acetaldehyde which reached 4.7 µmol·s-1·gcat-1 at 400˚C. The 13.5 wt% of tungsten on montmorillonite catalyst performed the highest reaction rate of ethylene and diethyl ether which reached 64.07 µmol·s-1·gcat-1 at 400˚C and 14.7 µmol·s-1·gcat-1 at 250˚C, respectively.