Hydrogenation of 2-Butyne-1, 4-Diol in Supercritical Carbon Dioxide Promoted by Stainless Steel Reactor Wall

摘要

Butane-1,4-diol is a useful intermediate in the manufacture of fine chemicals, such as polybutylene and polyurethane polymers, tetrahydrofuran and so on. Practical use of butane-1,4-diol may be greatly increased if it could be produced more cheaply. Traditional methods are based on catalytic hydrogenation of 2-butyne-1,4-diol with transition metal catalysts in aqueous solution or organic solvents. Due to the presence of Catalysts, promoters and organic solvents, additional separation step is necessary and the catalysts would suffer from fast deactivation at high temperatures. Recently supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO_2) is playing an important role in the development of green chemical industrial processes for its environmentally benign nature, nontoxicity, abundance, low cost and wide tuning ability of solvent parameters. In this work, we propose a process of 2-butyne-1,4-diol hydrogenation using scCO_2 medium in the absence of any catalysts, in which the reaction is promoted by stainless steal reactor wall. It is an environmentally benign green process as it is free of organic solvents, catalysts and additives.