Valorization of lignite to arene-rich compounds via two-stage selective cleavage of C-O bridged bonds over Co-MoS2

Directly converting lignite into arenes as commodity chemicals and drop-in fuels is a highly desirable target for researchers. However, this is severely limited by the presence of stable inter unit C-O linkages in lignite. Herein, a highly active catalyst, Co-MoS 2 , has been designed and prepared to be used for the selective catalytic cleavage of inter unit C-O bridged bonds (BBs) in the conversion of Naomaohu (NMH), a lignite, to yield arenes. Both catalytic hydrogenation conversion (CHC) and thermal dissolution (a non-catalytic process, named NCHC) of NMH were conducted using n-hexane as the solvent. The soluble fractions from the first stage of NCHC (SF NCHC-1 ) and CHC (SF CHC-1 ), as well as the second stage of NCHC (SF NCHC-2 ) and CHC (SF CHC-2 ) were obtained using the same solvent. After the first-stage catalytic treatment, the relative contents of arenes and alkanes in SF CHC-1 increased by 16.7 % and 9.3 %, respectively, compared to those in SF NCHC-1 , and the relative content of oxygen-containing compounds (OCCs), such as alcohols, phenols , esters, ketones , acids, and furans, decreased by 13.2 %. For the second-stage conversion, the relative contents of arenes and alkanes in SF CHC-2 were 53.5 % and 15.5 % higher than those in SF NCHC-2 , and the relative contents of OCCs was only 6.6 % in SF CHC-2 . The catalytic mechanisms of cleavage of C-O BBs and deoxygenation were proposed based on the CHC of model compounds and density functional theory (DFT) calculation. The adsorption of OCCs and the activation of released hydrogen radical (H·) by Co-MoS 2 , followed by H· addition to the carbon atom connected to oxygen in C-O BBs and oxygen-containing functional groups, are crucial for the cleavage of C-O BBs and formation of deoxygenated compounds, particularly arenes.