The conversion of propene and ethene over AlPO 4-11

Abstract

Bhatia and Phillips have recently reported the conversion of 1-butene to C{sub 6}-C{sub 8} aromatics over the aluminophosphate molecular sieve AlPO{sub 4}-11 in the temperature range 673-873 K. A mechanism was proposed in which dehydrogenation of 1-butene was followed by dimerization of the resulting 1,3-butadiene; the dimer could either cyclize to an aromatic or crack to lighter products. The conversion to aromatics was much less than that observed over H-ZSM-5 and was attributed to the known weak acidity of AlPO{sub 4}-11. The absence of C{sub 9}{sup +} aromatics in the product supported the proposed mechanism; steric hindrance in the elliptical pores (0.67 {times} 0.44 nm) prevented butene trimers from forming. To further the understanding of olefin reactions over AlPO{sub 4}-11, the conversion of ethene and propene has been studied.