Northwestern University Facility for Clean Catalytic Process Research. Final Technical Report.

摘要

Catalytic processes are today practiced on a vast scale to convert basic feedstocks (today largely petroleum, gas, and coal based) into fuels, plastics, agricultural chemicals, pharmaceuticals, foods, paints/coatings, and numerous other materials that underpin our economy and well-being. Catalysts are also used extensively to provide a cleaner environment by treating automotive and industrial (e.g., power plant) exhausts and water-borne effluents. Indeed, it has been estimated that more than 50% of the US GDP derives from catalytic processes. In the past several years, it has become apparent that the US energy supply and demand picture has shifted dramatically, and that a major scientific research and development effort must be mounted to maintain US economic leadership and our quality of life. The challenges are to use and convert more abundant, lower cost/lower quality, and more sustainable feedstocks into the products we need with unprecedented energy- and atom-efficiency. The need to develop more efficient, cleaner and greener catalytic processes is grand challenge of national import.