No abstract

Aqueous phase reforming of sorbitol was carried out in a 1.7 m long, 320 mm ID microchannel reactor with a 5 mm Pt-based washcoated catalyst layer, combined with nitrogen stripping. The performance of this microchannel reactor is correlated to the mass transfer properties, reaction kinetics, hydrogen selectivity and product distribution. Mass transfer does not affect the rate of sorbitol consumption, which is limited by the kinetics of the reforming reaction. Mass transfer significantly affects the hydrogen selectivity and the product distribution. The rapid consumption of hydrogen in side reactions at the catalyst surface is prevented by a fast mass transfer of hydrogen from the catalyst site to the gas phase in the microchannel reactor. This results in a decrease of the concentration of hydrogen at the catalyst surface, which was found to enhance the desired reforming reaction rate at the expense of the undesired hydrogen consuming reactions. Compared to a fixed bed reactor, the selectivity to hydrogen in the microchannel reactor was increased by a factor of 2. The yield of side products (mainly C3 and heavier hydrodeoxygenated species) was suppressed while the yield of hydrogen was increased from 1.4 to 4 moles per mole of sorbitol fed.

The alkylation of benzene with ethane has been studied over the Pt/H‐MFI catalyst in the presence of intermetallic compounds and titanium as hydrogen acceptors. The addition of hydrogen scavengers shifts the thermodynamic equilibrium of the reaction and allows for an improvement in the catalytic activity. In the presence of Ti, Zr2Fe, and ZrV2, the initial conversion of ethane increases by 5–7 times with respect to the neat catalyst. However, the positive effect of hydrogen acceptors decreased with time on stream, owing to saturation of their capacity.

This paper focuses on the heterogeneously catalyzed reactive extraction and separation in reaction steps in organic and aqueous phases during the transformation of biomass derived products. Two approaches are demonstrated for decomposing and preserving routes for biomass transformation into valuable products. The decomposing approach has been validated by transformation of glycerol into building blocks like CO, CO