Highly selective catalytic hydrodeoxygenation of guaiacol to benzene in continuous operation mode

Benzene, mostly produced from fossil fuel sources, is an essential chemical to many modern industries. Alternatively to non-renewable methods currently used, the present work explores using fast pyrolysis biomass-derived bio-oils to furnish this valuable platform molecule. Notably, we report for the first time the impact of different operational parameters on the highly selective continuous catalytic hydrodeoxygenation of guaiacol, a bio-oil model compound, into benzene using a Mo₂C/CNF-based catalyst. The parametric study includes a first evaluation of the effect of the hydrogen pressure (25, 50 and 75 bar), temperature (300, 325 and 350 °C) and weight hourly space velocity (4 and 10 g_org g_cat⁻¹ h⁻¹) on the guaiacol conversion and product distribution, and a subsequent long-term evaluation (30 h on stream) of the catalyst under appropriate processing conditions The experimental results revelated that our Mo₂C/CNF was able to achieve a conversion of 90–98% with a relative amount of benzene in the liquid product up to 81% for at least 30 h without any sign of deactivation at 75 bar of H₂ and 350 °C, which is a landmark achievement in the conversion of bio-oil derived molecules into platform chemicals.