Towards stable nickel catalysts for selective hydrogenation of biomass-based BHMF into THFDM

Selective transformation of BHMF (2,5-bis(hydroxymethyl)furan) to THFDM (tetrahydrofuran-2,5-dimethanol) over a variety structured Ni/Sx-Z1-x catalysts was investigated. The effects support, Ni loading, solvent, temperature, pressure, and particle size on the conversion selectivity were studied. Among them, 10 wt% catalyst supported SiO2:ZrO2 weight ratio 90:10 (10NiS90Z10) exhibits best performance in terms selectivity. Its good attributed its well-balanced properties, that depend upon ZrO2 content support combination with SiO2, active sites-support interaction, acidity/basicity each resulting different dispersions. Importantly, 10NiS90Z10 showed stable (>94%), 99.4% during 2 h reaction time. Poor catalytic activity resulted from excessive (>10 wt.%). structural, textural, acidity properties NiSi100-y-Zry catalysts, tuned by selectively varying amount 5 15 wt.%, critically investigated using numerous material characterization techniques. Catalyst recycling experiments revealed could be recycled several times without any measurable loss activity.