Campus Units

Chemical and Biological Engineering, Ames Laboratory, NSF Engineering Research Center for Biorenewable Chemicals

Document Type

Article

Research Focus Area

Catalysis and Reaction Engineering

Publication Version

Published Version

Publication Date

2019

Journal or Book Title

Green Chemistry

Volume

21

Issue

22

First Page

6210

Last Page

6219

DOI

10.1039/C9GC02264C

Abstract

Electrochemical conversion of biomass-derived compounds is a promising route for sustainable chemical production. Herein, we report unprecedentedly high efficiency for conversion of 5-(hydroxymethyl)furfural (HMF) to biobased monomers by pairing HMF reduction and oxidation half-reactions in one electrochemical cell. Electrocatalytic hydrogenation of HMF to 2,5-bis(hydroxymethyl)furan (BHMF) was achieved under mild conditions using carbon-supported Ag nanoparticles (Ag/C) as the cathode catalyst. The competition between Ag-catalyzed HMF hydrogenation to BHMF and undesired HMF hydrodimerization and hydrogen evolution reactions was sensitive to cathode potential. Also, the carbon support material in Ag/C was active for HMF reduction at strongly cathodic potentials, leading to additional hydrodimerization and low BHMF selectivity. Accordingly, precise control of the cathode potential was implemented to achieve high BHMF selectivity and efficiency. In contrast, the selectivity of HMF oxidation facilitated by a homogeneous electrocatalyst, 4-acetamido-TEMPO (ACT, TEMPO = 2,2,6,6-tetramethylpiperidine-1-oxyl), together with an inexpensive carbon felt electrode, was insensitive to anode potential. Thus, it was feasible to conduct HMF hydrogenation to BHMF and oxidation to 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA) in a single divided cell operated under cathode potential control. Electrocatalytic HMF conversion in the paired cell achieved high yields of BHMF and FDCA (85% and 98%, respectively) and a combined electron efficiency of 187%, corresponding to a nearly two-fold enhancement compared to the unpaired cells.

Comments

This article is published as Chadderdon, Xiaotong H., David J. Chadderdon, Toni Pfennig, Brent H. Shanks, and Wenzhen Li. "Paired electrocatalytic hydrogenation and oxidation of 5-(hydroxymethyl) furfural for efficient production of biomass-derived monomers." Green Chemistry 21, no. 22 (2019): 6210-6219. DOI: 10.1039/C9GC02264C. Posted with permission.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 License

Copyright Owner

The Royal Society of Chemistry

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

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