Polyolefins Journal
With the collaboration of Iran Polymer Society

Preparing a modified and promoted homogeneous titanium catalyst for ethylene dimerization to butene-1

Document Type : Original research

Authors

Sajjad Bahrami Reyhan 1
Seyed Mahdi Alavi 2
Davood Soudbar 3

1 Chemical Engineering Department, Iran University of Science and Technology, Tehran, I.R. Iran

2 School of chemical engineering oil and gas Iran University of Science and Technology, Tehran, I.R. Iran

3 Research and Development Department of Shazand Petrochemical Co., Arak, Iran

https://doi.org/10.22063/poj.2024.3559.1293
Abstract
Ethylene dimerization is a significant process among the other petrochemical processes due to the production of alpha olefins as the most widely used industrial intermediate. Titanium tetra butoxide/tetrahydrofuran/triethyl aluminum is the main homogeneous catalyst complex in this process. On the other hand, the formation of polymer or oligomerization side reactions are the salient obstacles in the ethylene dimerization process. The effect of various promoters from the group of halo hydrocarbons, along with different modifiers from the group of esters and silane compounds had been investigated to conquer the barriers mentioned above. The reaction conversion, selectivity, and polymer production were the remarkable parameters that were evaluated to study the components’ impacts. The results indicated that the addition of promoters through reaction with Triethyl aluminum (TEA) (co-catalyst) increased the reaction speed and thus increased the conversion of the reaction to 88.26% and reduced the reaction time to 60 min. Among the promoters, the reaction conversion and selectivity of dichloromethane were 88.26% and 78.45%, higher than that of dibromopropane (48.52% and 39.52%), but a higher amount of polymer was produced by dichloromethane. Moreover, Esters strongly decreased the catalyst activity, resulting in a decrease in the conversion to under 25%. On the other hand, silanes showed a significant effect on the control of the polymer chains in Ziegler-Natta homogeneous catalysts. Dicyclopentyldimethoxysilane (DCPDS) modifier brought about an increase of 1.5% in ethylene conversion and a 6% increase in the 1-butene selectivity. At the same time, the polymer formation also prevented a significant amount so the amount of polymer decreased to about 2.1 mg. DCPDS modifier performed better than the Cyclohexylmethyldimethoxysilane (CHMDS) donor.

Keywords

Butene-1
homogeneous catalyst
dimerization
ethylene conversion
promotor
Subjects
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  • Receive Date 07 January 2024
  • Revise Date 28 February 2024
  • Accept Date 02 March 2024
  • First Publish Date 03 March 2024

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