Selective conversion of organic pollutant p-chlorophenol to formic acid using zeolite Fenton catalyst

Effective remediation technologies which can converse the harmful organic pollutants to high-value chemicals are crucial both for wastewater treatment and energy regeneration. This study provides an evidence that extracting useful chemicals from wastewater is feasible through selective conversion of p-chlorophenol to high value formic acid as an example. The reported system works with a readily available Fe-containing ZSM-5 catalyst, water as the solvent and hydrogen peroxide as the oxidant. The yield of formic acid reached up to 50.7% when the Si/Al ratio of ZSM-5 was 80 and the Fe-content was 1.4%. By X-ray adsorption fine structure (XAFS), NH3 temperature-programmed desorption (NH3-TPD) technique, the pyridine adsorption Fourier-transition infrared (Py-IR) spectroscopy and adsorption measurements, it was concluded that the controllable degradation of p-CP could be approached through selective adsorption, the moderate Brønsted acid sites for H2O2 activation and the properly selective conversion control due to extra-framework coordination unsaturated sites (CUS) of Fe. This approach might provide a new avenue for the field of organic pollutant remediation.