Rationalize the synthesis of zeolite catalysts by understanding reaction mechanism

Abstract

The present thesis focuses on the rationalization of the zeolite synthesis for catalysis by understanding the nature of active sites and their microenvironments, together with their influence on the mechanisms of catalyzed reactions. In the first part of the thesis, efforts have been put on attempting to achieve the regioselective locating of active sites in zeolite catalyst and, more specifically, on tunning acid site locations in zeolite framework. The development of zeolite synthesis strategy and an indicator that can describe the aluminum distribution in the zeolite framework is important to evaluate if the final objective has been achieved. In this part, in order to evaluate aluminum distribution in MFI framework, an indicator based on monomolecular and bimolecular mechanisms of n-hexene catalytic cracking was proposed. First, several ZSM-5 samples were synthesized, which have been reported in the literature to have different aluminum distributions. These samples were characterized to be analogous in physicochemical properties and, then, tested in the n-hexene cracking to justify the usefulness of the indicator proposed in this work. Using 27Al MAS NMR, the aluminum locations were proved to be different, which was also reflected by the indicator in this thesis, justifying its applicability to evaluate aluminum locations. Afterward, this indicator has been employed to check the zeolite synthesis methodology that could potentially lead to different aluminum distribution in zeolite frameworks. Then, boron-assisted synthesis is proposed considering that boron and aluminum may have competitive positioning in ZSM-5 framework. Then, and by means of DFT calculations, we have studied if the unit cell of MFI shows different stabilities when substituted by aluminum and/or boron in different T positions. It has been found that boron location is less favored when introduced in 10-ring channels of the MFI framework, while aluminum shows no preference for positioning among all the T-sites. ZSM-5 samples with different Si/Al and Si/B were synthesized and their physicochemical properties as well as the relative proportion of paired and isolated states of aluminum was characterized. Characterization includes n-hexene cracking, for which the samples showed different preference toward monomolecular and bimolecular reactions. Finally, once the materials were proved to have different aluminum distribution, they were employed in methanol-to-propene (MTP) reactions to show the influence of aluminum distribution on an industry-relevant reaction where the spatial confinement has an important impact. Indeed, the samples with aluminum preferentially positioned in 10-ring channel favored more monomolecular cracking and less bimolecular side reactions such as oligomerization and hydrogen transfer, giving higher propene yield and lower amount of alkanes and aromatics. The second part of the thesis focuses on rationalizing the synthesis of zeolites with cavities for catalyzing a priory selected reaction. More specifically, zeolite synthesis was carried out using OSDAs that mimic the transition state (TS) or relevant intermediate in the target reaction. Ethylbenzene production by transalkylation between diethylbenzene and benzene was selected as the reaction to be catalyzed. A potential reaction TS was established and diaryldimethylphosphonium OSDA was synthesized that mimicks the transition state in the diaryl-mediated mechanism of transalkylation between benzene and diethylbenzene. Then, the OSDA successfully led to the formation of the large-pore zeolite ITQ-27. This ITQ-27 was tested in the reaction of transalkylation between benzene and diethylbenzene. The catalytic performance of this material was benchmarked to be superior than other commercially employed zeolites, such as USY, mordenite or Beta with similar physicochemical properties. Finally, Methanol to olefins (MTO) reaction was chosen as another target catalytic system, where the r