Titanium Phosphate with Flower-like Morphology As an Effective Reusable Catalyst for Chemical Fixation of CO2 at Mild Reaction Conditions

Abstract

CO2 insertion reactions draw the attention of researchers today as they could have a major positive impact on the global carbon balance. Flower-like mesoporous titanium phosphate (Ti(HPO4)2·H2O) has been produced by an easy template-free method via refluxing at 50 °C for 18 h. The product is characterized by PXRD, UV–vis, FTIR, N2 adsorption–desorption, FESEM, and TEM studies. The material showed the generation of identical mesopores at 3.9 nm. The titanium phosphate material showed brilliant catalytic activity for the synthesis of cyclic organic carbonates and carbamates with high yields up to 97% and 93%, respectively, via chemical fixation of the greenhouse gas CO2 over different epoxide and amine substrates, respectively, in a solvent-free state at room temperature within a short reaction period. The reusability of the phosphate material has also been examined for 5 cycles for each of the two reactions.