The formation of propane, propylene, and acetone from 2-propanol over vanadium pentoxide and modified vanadium pentoxide catalysts

Abstract

The catalytic decomposition of 2-propanol has been studied in a flow System from 200 to 280 °C on vanadium pentoxide and modified vanadium pentoxide catalysts. Results were obtained with separate melts of the oxide containing 9.09 mol% of each of the alkali metal sulfates and with individual preparations of the pentoxide containing 1.01, 2.00, and 4.98 mol% potassium sulfate, respectively. In addition to expected dehydration and dehydrogenation reactions, propane was formed over the entire temperature range and became a dominant product at higher temperatures.Kinetic experiments showed that the dehydration and dehydrogenation reactions were zero order with respect to ail components while the propane-forming reaction gave a rate order of 0.3 with respect to 2-propanol concentration. Elimination-type mechanisms have been proposed to explain the results and some evidence of a relationship between catalyst activities and surface acidity is presented. The observed kinetic compensation effect bas been shown to compare well with previous work on 2-propanol decomposition on metal oxides.