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Updated: Sep 27, 2025
Synthesis of Esters Via a Greener Steglich Esterification in Acetonitrile
Published on: October 30, 2018
Readily-fabricated supported MgO catalysts for efficient and green synthesis of diethyl carbonate from ethyl
Fengjiao Li1,2, Liguo Wang3, Shuang Xu3
1Shenzhen Automotive Research Institute, Beijing Institute of Technology Shenzhen 518118 Guangdong China lifengjiao@szari.ac.cn.
Abstract:
Developing cost-effective, high-efficiency and heterogeneous catalysts is of prime importance for the green synthesis of diethyl carbonate (DEC) from ethyl carbamate (EC) and ethanol. Herein, a series of MgO/γ-Al2O3 catalysts were readily fabricated by an impregnation method for DEC synthesis from EC and ethanol. The activities of the as-prepared MgO/γ-Al2O3 catalysts as well as the individual MgO or γ-Al2O3 were first tested in the batch reactor. Among the investigated samples, the MgO/γ-Al2O3 with a MgO loading of 10 wt% (denoted as 10% MgO/γ-Al2O3) exhibited the largest amount of stronger basic sites, and the highest activities with EC conversion of 41.8% and DEC yield of 30.4%, respectively. Furthermore, the DEC yield was greatly boosted to 52.1% with a high DEC selectivity of 93.8% over the 10% MgO/γ-Al2O3 catalyst under the optimized reaction conditions in the fixed bed reactor, outperforming most of the reported catalysts.
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