Study on MoO/SBA-16 catalyzed transesterification to synthesize diphenyl carbonate

In this paper, the mesoporous molecular sieve SBA-16 with good dispersion was prepared by hydrothermal method. Under the condition of Si/Mo= 1.0, MoO₃/SBA-16 catalysts were prepared by iso-dipping method at 550 °C, 650 °C and 750 °C calcination temperature, which for the synthesis of diphenyl carbonate (DPC) from dimethyl carbonate (DMC) and phenyl acetate (PA) was used, and the uncalcined MoO₃/SBA-16 was used as a reference. XRD, TG-DTA, XPS, ICP-MS, FT-IR, BET, SEM and TEM characterization. The effects of calcination temperature and reaction conditions on the catalytic performance of MoO₃/SBA-16 in transesterification of DMC and PA were investigated. The results show that the MoO₃/SBA-16 catalyst prepared at 550 °C has the best catalytic performance in the reaction of DMC and PA ester exchange, and the catalyst has the best catalytic performance in the appropriate reaction strip (n(PA) = 1.0 mol; n (PA)/n (DMC) = 2.0; m (MoO₃/SBA-16) = 6.0g; t = 5.0 h; T = 180 °C), the DMC conversion is 78.5%, and the selectivity of methyl phenyl carbonate (MPC) and DPC is 51.1% and 46.5%, respectively. After five cycles, the catalyst activity decreased and the conversion of DMC decreased from 78.5% to 15.8%. However, its crystal structure remained unchanged. The used catalyst can be easily regenerated by calcination in air at 550 °C for 5 h. The catalytic performance of the regenerated catalyst was almost as high as that of the fresh one.