Abstract
Factors influencing dehydration of xylose to furfural, such as catalyst and extract agents, were investigated. Results indicated that high-temperature water may substitute for solid and liquid acid as a catalyst, and ethyl butyrate improved furfural yield for the high distribution coefficient. A furfural yield of 75 % was obtained at 200 °C for 3 h in ethyl butyrate/water. The reaction kinetics of xylose dehydration to furfural was investigated and it was found that the reaction order was 0.5, and the activation energy was 68.5 kJ/mol. The rate constant k showed a clear agreement with the Arrhenius law from 160 to 200 °C.
Highlights
Furfural, which is readily obtained from renewable biomass, is a key biomass-derived chemical that can be used to replace petrochemicals (Dias et al 2005a; Lichtenthaler 1998)
The furfural yield of 50 % in High-temperature water (HTW) was attributed to the high value of Kw of HTW (Akiya and Savage 2002)
The reason for the yield of no more than 50 % in HTW was attributed to the condensation reaction between xylose in the long residence time in HTW
Summary
Furfural, which is readily obtained from renewable biomass, is a key biomass-derived chemical that can be used to replace petrochemicals (Dias et al 2005a; Lichtenthaler 1998). Furfural is conventionally produced by hydrolysis of a variety of biomass sources including almond shell, sugarcane, and corn with the aid of liquid acid catalysts at high temperatures (200–250 °C) (Kim et al 2011). Zhang et al (2012) reported that 1-butanol from biomass-based carbohydrates can be used as a renewable extraction solvent in a biphasic system on a MCM-41 catalyst, and 1-butanol can obviously increase the yield of furfural. HTW can partly replace acid catalyst to produce high ionic products (Jing and LU 2007). Kinetic studies of furfural formation have been conducted by using xylose or hemicellulose as a starting material on heterogeneous catalysts (Dias et al 2005b; O’Neill et al 2009), such as mineral acids (Marcotullio and De Jong 2010; Morinelly et al 2009).
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