Hydrogenolysis of glycerol over Cu-substituted hydrocalumite mediated catalysts

A series of Cu-substituted hydrocalumite with different content of Cu ^{2 +} were synthesized and used as the precursor of bifunctional Cu/solid base catalysts (Cu _x/Ca _yAlO _{y + 1.5}) in this work. It was found that mainly hydrocalumite formed when the content of Cu ^{2 +} was lower (x < 1.5 in [Cu _xCa _yAl(OH) _{2x + 2y + 2}]NO ₃· nH ₂O). After controlled calcination and hydrogen reduction, Cu dispersed highly in the matrix of Ca _yAlO _{y + 1.5} and the total amount of basic sites reached its maximum in Cu _1.5/Ca _2.0AlO _3.5. These catalysts were active and selective for the hydrogenolysis of glycerol under mild conditions. The calculated specific activity of surface Cu increased with the basicity of catalysts. The detected conversion of glycerol on Cu _1.5/Ca _2.0AlO _3.5 reached 75.3% with a 98.1% selectivity towards 1,2-PDO at 180 °C, 2.0 MPa H ₂ and 21 h.