The catalytic hydrogenation of furfural to 2-methylfuran over the Mg-Al oxides supported Co-Ni bimetallic catalysts

In this paper, an efficient nickel-cobalt bimetallic catalyst was designed and developed for catalytic hydrogenation of furfural, one of the biomass platform products, to 2-methylfuran, a high value-added chemicals. The NiCo-MgAlO catalysts were synthesized by the co-precipitation method and characterized by H-2-TPR, XRD, N-2 adsorption-desorption analysis, O2-TPO, FAL-TPD, NH3-TPD, TEM and other methods. These results revealed that the Ni/Co ratio, solvent, reaction temperature, pressure, time, and, most importantly, the catalyst reduction conditions had a major impact on this reaction. 100% of furfural conversion and 92.3% of 2-MF selectivity were achieved over the Ni10Co5-MgAlO-3h catalyst with its Ni/Co molar ratio of 2 when employed 2-butanol was the solvent. It could maintain high activity even after using it several times. The bimetallic Ni10Co5-MgAlO catalyst owned homogeneous composition of Ni-Co alloy nanoparticles and more middle-acid sites than the monometallic Ni-10-MgAlO catalyst, which might promote C-O bond cleavage and improve 2-MF selectivity due to its oxygen affinity. The high yield of 2-methylfuran from furfural may be due to the synergistic effects of the metal sites and the acid sites on the Ni-Co bimetallic catalyst's surface.