Understanding Catalyst Selection for Levoglucosenone Hydrogenation

M. PARREÑO; R.A. SPANEVELLO; M.E. DOMINE; J. MAZARÍO; M. CHÁVEZ-SIFONTES; A.G. SUÁREZ; P. CONCEPCIÓN; M.B. COMBA

Valencia

Simposio; XVI Simposio de Jóvenes Investigadores Químicos; 2019

Universidad de Valencia

Levoglucosenone (LGO), a cellulose derived chiral synthon, is recently gaining attention to produce commodity chemicals thanks to the FuracellTM technology, a continuous process to convert cellulosic biomass into LGO. This work presents the lookout for an adequate combination of metal and support to hydrogenate LGO to either Cyrene (CYR) or levoglucosanol (LGOL) (Fig. 1), while unveiling the physicochemical properties (i.e. support acidity, metal particle size and morphology) required to selectively attain each product in one-pot process. On one hand, Pd/t-ZrO2 catalyst shows ≈95% yield to CYR under mild conditions (80 ⁰C, PH2 = 10 bar), with low catalyst loading (≈3wt%) and water as solvent. On the other hand, novel and efficient one-pot hydrogenation to LGOL with ≈90% yield is here reported by using Pt/ZrO2-mix catalyst under very mild reaction conditions (45 ⁰C, PH2 = 18 bar) and water as solvent. Comparison with results attained with other materials, along with FTIR experiments with CO as probe molecule, let us conclude that metal facets play a key role in these hydrogenations. In addition, catalyst re-usability and real biomass-derived feed were assayed, thus demonstrating the possibility of scaling-up the process over these catalysts.