Synergistic effect of dual Brønsted acidic deep eutectic solvents for oxidative desulfurization of diesel fuel

Wei Jiang, Kun Zhu, Hongping Li, Linhua Zhu, Mingqing Hua, Jin Xiao, Chao Wang, Zhenzhen Yang, Guangying Chen, Wenshuai Zhu, Huaming Li, Sheng Dai

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

134 Scopus citations

Abstract

Deep eutectic solvents (DESs) are generally used as attractive solvents or extractants rather than catalysts in the field of synthesis and separation. Herein, dual Brønsted acidic DESs were prepared by mixing sulfonated quaternary ammonium and oxalic acid as extractants and catalysts for deep oxidative desulfurization. Compared to the DESs with single acidic group, the dual acidic DESs exhibited much higher catalytic activity likely due to the synergistic effect. The 1H NMR study indicated that the weak interaction between DES and sulfur compounds led to a low extraction capacity. However, the sulfur removal could reach 97.7% under optimized reaction conditions. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations demonstrated that sulfonic group and carboxylic group are of equal importance to desulfurization performance. Further, the desulfurization efficiency was also strongly affected by the viscosity of DESs. Here, we put forward a new strategy that the reaction time could be sharply shortened to 40 min and 100 min by adding low viscous acetonitrile and polyethylene glycol into DES to form mixing reaction system, respectively.

Original languageEnglish
Article number124831
JournalChemical Engineering Journal
Volume394
DOIs
StatePublished - Aug 15 2020

Funding

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 21978119 , 21808092 , and 21766007 ), a Project Funded by the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions . This research work is supported by the high performance computing platform of Jiangsu University and Qinglan project of Jiangsu Province. S. D. was supported by the Division of Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, U.S. Department of Energy.

FundersFunder number
U.S. Department of Energy
Basic Energy Sciences
Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, and Biosciences Division
National Natural Science Foundation of China21808092, 21766007, 21978119
Jiangsu University
Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions
Qinglan Project of Jiangsu Province of China

    Keywords

    • Deep eutectic solvents
    • Dual Brønsted acidity
    • Low viscosity
    • Oxidative desulfurization

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