Study on reaction for chemical refinery using biomass as resources

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In order to convert and utilize biomass as raw material of chemical industry, chemical reaction of sugar type biomass was investigated. The study consists of two parts: 1) the research on degradation reaction of sugar type biomass in water of high temperature and high pressure, 2) the research on the catalytic conversion of the degradation intermediate into aromatic and olefin hydrocarbons. In the first part of the study concerning the degradation of biomass, glucose was used as a model raw material and reacted in the water under a near critical condition at 200 to 300 degree Celsius with addition of various catalysts. Without catalyst, glucose was isomerized to fructose and mainly converted to 5-hydroxylmethyl-furfural (5-HMF). With addition of basic catalyst, dehydration to 5-HMF was reduced, and the products such as glycol aldehyde and dihydroxyacetone were obtained by retro-aldol reaction. When acid catalyst was added, the dehydrated intermediate 5-HMF was converted to organic acid, especially, levulinic acid at a high yield. It was also found that the conversion of glucose to levulinic acid proceeded at a high glucose concentration more than 30 wt%. In the second part of the study, the conversion of organic acids such as levulinic acid and acetic acid was performed in the presence of zeolite catalyst. It was found from this research that the organic acids were efficiently converted to ketones and finally to the mixture of aromatic compounds and olefin hydrocarbons of lower carbon numbers. This reaction could proceed in the presence of water. It was also found that the final products could be separated from water very easily by gravitational phase separation, which means that distillation is not necessary. From this study, many information about catalyst performance and catalytic reactor were obtained.