Ni/SiO 2 , Fe/SiO 2 and bimetallic FeNi/SiO 2 catalysts with different Fe/Ni weight ratios were prepared by incipient-wetness impregnation method for the deoxygenation of methyl laurate to hydrocarbons. It was found that a suitable amount of Fe enhanced the activity of Ni/SiO 2 for the deoxygenation of methyl laurate, and FeNi(0.25)/SiO 2 with a Fe/Ni weight ratio of 0.25 showed the best activity. Moreover, the addition of Fe to Ni/SiO 2 significantly promoted the hydrodeoxygenation pathway to produce more C12 hydrocarbon and suppressed the activity for C-C hydrogenolysis. The effect of Fe on the performance of Ni/SiO 2 is ascribed the formation of the NiFe alloy particles, particularly with the Fe-enriched surface at low Fe content, and the existence of oxygen vacancies in Fe oxides. A mechanism is proposed to explain the promoting effect of Fe, which involves the synergism between iron sites with strong oxophilicity and nickel sites with high ability to activate hydrogen. Besides, the effect of reaction conditions and catalyst stability were also investigated.

As the world's second most renewable resource, lignin has been studied for depolymerization into useful chemicals and fuels for many years. However, although good results were achieved in laboratory tests, it is difficult to apply those techniques into industrial production. One of the main obstacles is the costly separation tasks of complex degradation products, as reflected from the case of industrial production of vanillin from lignin. In this article, we introduce and discuss the degradation strategies and products that are potential for lignin depolymerization into valuable chemicals on a commercial scale. Based on the viewpoint of not only conversion and yield but also the complexity of degradation products, five categories of products and corresponding processes are recommended as more promising chemicals for industrial production in the near future.

A highly selective reductive catalytic fractionation technology at atmospheric condition (ARCF) is developed to produce lignin monomers.

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Upgrading lignin-derived monomeric products is crucial in bio-refinery to effectively utilize lignin. Herein, we report a simple strategy to convert catechol to phenazine, a useful N-heterocycle three-aromatic-ring compound, whose current...