Sustainable Production of 2,3-Pentanedione: Catalytic Performance of Ba2P2O7 Doped with Cs for Vapor-Phase Condensation of Lactic Acid

Sustainable production of 2,3-pentanedione from lactic acid over Ba2P2O7 doped with Cs was investigated. Varying Cs components and calcination temperature can efficiently tune the acid–base properties of catalysts. It was found that both base site density and acid site density had a marked impact on catalytic performance for condensation of lactic acid to 2,3-pentanedione. Enhanced base site density and acid site density favor the catalytic activity. Furthermore, base/acid molar ratio has also played an important role on catalytic performance. From the observations based on the effect of Cs doped amount and calcination temperature, an appropriate base/acid molar ratio is around 8. Low reaction temperature as well as low LA LHSV favors selective formation of 2,3-pentanedione from lactic acid over the catalyst of 1.0CsNO3/2.5Ba2P2O7 calcined at 600 °C. Encouragingly, the condensation reaction of lactic acid proceeds efficiently at around 28 h on stream, and 2,3-pentanedione selectivity remains around 60%.