Selective hydrogen-removal MFI zeolite membrane reactor for one-step preparation of isoprene at low temperature

Isoprene is an important chemical raw material in the synthetic rubber and fine chemical industries. In this work, an MFI zeolite membrane reactor (ZMR) was designed for the one-step dehydrogenation of isopentane to isoprene. By selectively removing H 2 , the ZMR overcame thermodynamic equilibrium, thereby significantly enhancing conversion over a Pt-Sn/γ-Al 2 O 3 catalyst. The influence of reaction temperature, pressure, and weight hourly space velocity (WHSV) on the performance of the MFI ZMR was investigated. In a traditional packed-bed reactor, the isopentane conversion was 22.5%, and the isoprene yield was less than 2% at 400 °C, 100 kPa pressure, and a WHSV of 0.50 h −1 . In stark contrast, the isopentane conversion and isoprene yield in the MFI ZMR reached 38.7% and 16.0%, respectively. Furthermore, the MFI ZMR demonstrated stable operation during prolonged testing under optimized conditions. These results highlight the feasibility of the MFI ZMR in this study for the one-step production of isoprene from isopentane dehydrogenation.