Supported ionic liquid phase (SILP) catalysis: A promising new industrial process design?

I&EC 318

Anders Riisager, ar@kemi.dtu.dk1, Betina Jørgensen2, Rasmus Fehrmann, rf@kemi.dtu.dk1, Marco Haumann, Marco.Haumann@crt.cbi.uni-erlangen.de3, and Peter Wasserscheid, Peter.Wasserscheid@crt.cbi.uni-erlangen.de3. (1) Department of Chemistry and Center for Sustainable and Green Chemistry, Technical University of Denmark, Building 206, Kgs. Lyngby, DK-2800, Denmark, (2) Center for Sustainable and Green Chemistry, Department of Chemistry, Technical University of Denmark, Building 206, Kgs. Lyngby, DK-2800, Denmark, (3) Lehrstuhl für Chemische Reaktionstechnik, Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Egerlandstrasse 3, Erlangen, D-91058, Germany
Supported ionic liquid phase (SILP) catalysts are new materials consisting of an ionic liquid metal catalyst solution highly dispersed on a porous support. The use of a non-volatile, ionic liquid catalyst phase in SILP catalysts results in a stable heterogeneous-type material with selectivity and efficiency like homogeneous catalysts. This makes the catalysts well suited for many industrial homogeneous catalysed processes like, e.g. C-C bond forming reactions, in continuous, gas-phase design using fixed-bed technology. In this contribution we report very promising results for continuous gas-phase alkene hydroformylation using a highly selective and durable silica-supported SILP Rh-bisphosphine catalyst. Additionally, the concept of continuous gas-phase SILP catalysis is introduced for related C-C bond forming reactions of industrial importance, which usually are performed in batch, liquid phase systems, e.g. hydroformylation of higher olefins and alcohol carbonylation for acetic acid production.