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Preparation and catalytic performance of tungstophosphoric acid anchored to SiO2@graphene aerogel 3D porous catalysts for the synthesis of ethyl levulinate biofuel

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Abstract

As fuel additives, ethyl levulinate (EL) can be used up to 5 wt% directly in the regular diesel engines, which can overcome the limited stock of fossil fuels and reduce the environment pollutions to some extent. In this work, the three-dimensional porous hybrids consisting of SiO2 and graphene aerogel, which are denoted as SiO2@GA, are facilely assembled and used as supports for H3PW12O40 (HPW)-based solid acid catalysts. Structural analysis confirms that the resultant HPW/SiO2@GA catalysts possess unique porous structure (SBET ≥ 257 m2 g−1, Vp ≥ 0.450 cm3 g−1) and exhibit excellent catalytic performance in the synthesis of EL by the esterification of levulinic acid (LA) with ethanol. The conversion of LA can be as high as 92.4% under the reaction conditions. Furthermore, various catalytic reaction parameters are also optimized over the 10 wt.% HPW/SiO2@GA catalysts, which exhibit the highest turnover frequency (TOF = 83.91 mmol g−1 h−1) among the resultant catalysts. The results confirm the promising application of the HPW/SiO2@GA heterogeneous catalysts in the synthesis of biofuel.

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Acknowledgements

Authors thank the financial supports of the National Natural Science Foundation of Jilin Province (CN) (No. U1304203), the Natural Science Foundation of Henan Province (CN) (No. 162300410258), the Foundation of Henan Educational Committee (No. 16A150046) and the Innovation Foundation of Zhengzhou University (No. 201810459003).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Zhengzhou University, Zhengzhou, 450001, China

    Xiu-Cheng Zheng, Ning Li, Shuai Jiang & Min Wu

  2. Department of Mechanical Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China

    Xiu-Cheng Zheng & Guang-Ping Zheng

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  2. Ning Li
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Zheng, XC., Li, N., Jiang, S. et al. Preparation and catalytic performance of tungstophosphoric acid anchored to SiO2@graphene aerogel 3D porous catalysts for the synthesis of ethyl levulinate biofuel. J Porous Mater 26, 723–732 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10934-018-0671-7

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