One-Step Process for the Production of BTEX and LPG-like fuel from Pentanediol

We report on a one-step process to produce value-added organic chemicals via deoxygenation of pentanediol (PeD) over HZSM-5 at temperatures between 325 and 450 °C and atmospheric pressure. The conversion efficiency of PeD to petroleum gas (C₂–C₅) and aromatics (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes) reached up to 94% (carbon yield); we observed minimal CO, CO₂, and coke production. Furthermore, the carbon yield to the desired products remained near 91.5% with a steady product distribution for 40 h. No severe degradation of catalytic activity of HZSM-5 due to the presence of water in the product stream was observed after multiple regenerations. The catalytic process represents a valuable step toward displacing petroleum-based chemicals

Carbon Dioxide Hydrogenation over a Metal-Free Carbon-Based Catalyst

The hydrogenation of CO₂ into useful chemicals provides an industrial-scale pathway for CO₂ recycling. The lack of effective thermochemical catalysts currently precludes this process, since it is challenging to identify structures that can simultaneously exhibit high activity and selectivity for this reaction. Here, we report, for the first time, the use of nitrogen-doped graphene quantum dots (NGQDs) as metal-free catalysts for CO₂ hydrogenation. The nitrogen dopants, located at the edge sites, play a key role in inducing thermocatalytic activity in carbon nanostructures. Furthermore, the thermocatalytic activity and selectivity of NGQDs are governed by the doped N configurations and their corresponding defect density. The increase of pydinic N concentration at the edge site of NGQDs leads to lower initial reaction temperature for CO₂ reduction and also higher CO₂ conversion and selectivity toward CH₄ over CO