CHEMCATCHEM
COMMUNICATIONS
DOI: 10.1002/cctc.201300991
Reduced Vanadium and Molybdenum Oxides Catalyze the
Equivalent Formation of Ethane and Acetaldehyde from
Ethanol
[
a]
Yoichi Nakamura, Toru Murayama, and Wataru Ueda*
Catalytic tests for ethanol conversion were performed on vana-
dium and molybdenum oxides with different oxidation states.
We found for the first time that equivalent amounts of ethane
The selectivities to ethane and acetaldehyde decreased and
the selectivity to ethylene increased over the reduced catalyst
because of the loss of active sites for the dehydrogenation of
[3]
and acetaldehyde were formed catalytically over V O3 and
ethanol. Other reports also show the relationship between
the selectivities to alkanes and aldehydes and the catalytic oxi-
dation states. Abu-Zied and El-Awad showed that the forma-
tion of ethane from ethanol over Cd-Cr-O catalysts proceeded
through the hydrogenation of ethylene produced by the dehy-
dration of ethanol. As the selectivity to ethane increased with
an increase in the selectivity to acetaldehyde and Cr is known
to form hydride species, CrÀH was proposed as the active spe-
cies in the hydrogenation of alcohols over Cr. In this reaction,
2
MoO . No influence of the reaction temperature was observed
2
on the selectivity to ethane and acetaldehyde in the range of
533–653 K over V O and MoO . The reactions of methanol,
2 3 2
1-propanol, and 2-propanol also produced the corresponding
alkanes and aldehydes in a 1:1 ratio. A reaction scheme for the
formation of ethane and acetaldehyde from ethanol is pro-
posed in which a hydrogen transfer reaction occurs between
two ethanol molecules adsorbed on the adjacent metal
cation–oxygen anion pair sites to form ethane, acetaldehyde,
and water in one step.
6+
3+
Cr was reduced from Cr to Cr during the catalysis because
of the absence of oxygen in the reaction stream. The reduced
[4]
Cr is highly active for the dehydration reaction. Mohamed
showed that ethane and methane were formed as major prod-
ucts over Fe-ion-exchanged mordenite. In this report, the for-
mation of ethane as a dominant product was explained mainly
Vanadium and molybdenum oxide catalysts have attracted
much attention because of their unique catalytic properties
and commercial application in various chemical processes.
These catalysts are known to be active as oxidation and acid
3+
[5]
by the high O-abstracting affinity of the Fe ions. Sumathi
et al. showed that the reducibility of the B site of ABB’O -type
3
[1]
catalysts in reactions such as the partial oxidation of alkanes
perovskite oxides (A=Ba, B=Pb, Ce, Ti, B’=Bi, Cu, Sb) played
an important role in the catalytic activity and selectivity in the
selective oxidation of benzyl alcohol. They showed that the
mechanism for the formation of toluene proceeded through
the hydrogenation of benzyl alcohol. The possibility that the
adsorbed hydrogen species formed from the dehydrogenation
of benzyl alcohol take up lattice oxide ions increases as the re-
[
2]
and dehydration of alcohols. In reports on the reaction of al-
cohols over vanadium and molybdenum oxide catalysts, the
catalytic reaction was performed in the presence of oxygen
and aldehydes, and carboxylic acid and CO were produced.
2
However, we found that ethane was formed from ethanol con-
version over vanadium and molybdenum oxides under N . The
2
[6]
formation of alkanes from the corresponding alcohols is not
normally a feature of the dehydration and dehydrogenation of
alcohols. There is no report that describes the formation of al-
kanes from alcohols over reduced vanadium or molybdenum
oxides. However, several reports describe the formation of al-
kanes from the corresponding alcohols, which are summarized
in Table 1.
ducibility of the B sites decreased.
On the other hand, some reports showed that almost the
same yield of alkanes and aldehydes were formed from corre-
sponding alcohols. Ohtani et al. showed that the simultaneous
formation of ethane and acetaldehyde occurred by the hydro-
genation of hemiacetal via the acetalization of ethanol and
acetaldehyde using acidified ethanol over TiO -PtO in a postir-
2
2
McMonagle and Moffat proposed that the formation of
ethane from ethanol over 12 molybdophosphates proceeds
through the secondary hydrogenation of ethylene formed by
the dehydration of ethanol because the selectivity to ethane
radiation dark reaction. The yield of ethane increased with de-
[7]
creasing yields of acetal and H2. Lobo et al. reported the for-
mation of propane and propionaldehyde in the same quantity
with H as the main product in the reaction of 1-propanol over
2
[8]
increased in the presence of H and the selectivity to acetalde-
Pt-supported catalysts (Pt/Al O , Pt/Ce O , Pt/TiO ). They pro-
2 3 2 3 2
2
hyde was always higher than that of ethane. In this study,
posed the mechanism for the formation of propane from
1-propanol to be through the hydrogenation of 1-propanol.
They indicated that the hydrogenation of propylene and the
shift of OH to other propanol molecules were unlikely because
propylene and diols were not observed. Jin et al. showed that
butane was formed from 1- and 2-butanol over Fe O , Fe O -
6+
5+
Mo in the catalyst was reduced to Mo during the reaction.
[a] Y. Nakamura, Prof. Dr. T. Murayama, Prof. Dr. W. Ueda
Catalysis Research Center
Hokkaido University
N-21, W-10, Sapporo (Japan)
Fax: (+81)117069163
2
3
2
3
ZrO , and Fe O -ZnO. They indicated that the formation of
2
2
3
E-mail: ueda@cat.hokudai.ac.jp
ꢀ
2014 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim
ChemCatChem 2014, 6, 741 – 744 741