Insights into the influence of feed impurities on catalytic performance in the solvent-free dimerization of renewable levulinic acid - Dataset

The influence of the most common impurities accompanying the levulinic acid produced in lignocellulosic biorefineries (sulfuric acid, water, formic acid, and furfural) has been studied on the catalytic performance of different kinds of heterogeneous acid catalysts: (i) sulfonic acid-based materials, such as propyl-sulfonic acid-modified SBA-15, and the sulfonic acid resin Amberlyst-70, and (ii) commercial acid zeolites, such as H-Beta-19 and H-Beta-75.

Furfural is the impurity that produces the greatest detrimental effect on the performances of all the catalysts tested. Catalyst deactivation is observed due to the formation of organic deposits on the catalyst surface (identified by TGA and acid-base titration), phenomenon that is accentuated when furfural is present in the reaction medium. Amberlyst-70 can recover almost totally the initial catalytic activity with a regeneration step based on washing with an acid solution under reflux.