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Updated: Aug 3, 2025

Heterogeneous Removal of Water-Soluble Ruthenium Olefin Metathesis Catalyst from Aqueous Media Via Host-Guest Interaction
Published on: August 23, 2018
Site-Selective Polyolefin Hydrogenolysis on Atomic Ru for Methanation Suppression and Liquid Fuel Production
Mingyu Chu1, Xianpeng Wang1, Xuchun Wang1,2
1Institute of Functional Nano & Soft Materials (FUNSOM), Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Advanced Negative Carbon Technologies, Joint International Research Laboratory of Carbon-Based Functional Materials and Devices, Soochow University, Suzhou 215123, P. R. China.
Abstract:
Catalytic hydrogenolysis of end-of-life polyolefins can produce value-added liquid fuels and therefore holds great promises in plastic waste reuse and environmental remediation. The major challenge limiting the recycling economic benefit is the severe methanation (usually >20%) induced by terminal C-C cleavage and fragmentation in polyolefin chains. Here, we overcome this challenge by demonstrating that Ru single-atom catalyst can effectively suppress methanation by inhibiting terminal C-C cleavage and preventing chain fragmentation that typically occurs on multi-Ru sites. The Ru single-atom catalyst supported on CeO2 shows an ultralow CH4 yield of 2.2% and a liquid fuel yield of over 94.5% with a production rate of 314.93 gfuels gRu -1 h-1 at 250 °C for 6 h. Such remarkable catalytic activity and selectivity of Ru single-atom catalyst in polyolefin hydrogenolysis offer immense opportunities for plastic upcycling.
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