Producing Acrylic Acid Using CO2 as Feedstock

A theoretical study headed by Bin Wang and funded by the Department of Energy modeled how carbon dioxide can be integrated with ethylene, the commonly used industrial chemical, to produce acrylic acid, a general ingredient of numerous household industrial products.

Bin Wang. Image Credit: University of Oklahoma

Bin Wang is an associate professor in the University of Oklahoma’s School of Chemical, Biological and Materials Engineering in the Gallogly College of Engineering.

Acrylic acid is used to produce clothing, disposable diapers, plastics, and various other consumer applications. At present, it is created by the oxidation of propene, a gaseous product of oil refineries.

If you can replace propene and find alternate ways to make acrylic acid using CO₂ as feedstock, there are two advantages. It provides an opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas and make CO₂ more valuable.

Bin Wang, Associate Professor, School of Chemical, Biological and Materials Engineering, Gallogly College of Engineering, University of Oklahoma

For over 40 years, scientists have been researching this alternative method to identify a more long-lasting solution to producing acrylic acid.

Over the last 40 years, homogenous catalysis—where the catalysts and the reactants are both dissolved in the same liquid phase—were explored for this reaction but with little success. What we tried to do in this proposal is to develop a heterogeneous catalysis process, in which the catalysts can be engineered with diverse functionality and can be recovered easily. This is something that hasn’t been done for this reaction in the literature.

Bin Wang, Associate Professor, School of Chemical, Biological and Materials Engineering, Gallogly College of Engineering, University of Oklahoma

Wang added that the researchers intend to apply quantum mechanical calculations to explain how carbon dioxide and ethylene couple and how the end product develops to better understand the mechanism and guide future experimental tests that use carbon dioxide as a replacement feedstock.

The three-year project, “Computational Design of Heterogeneous Catalysts for Coupling CO₂ and Ethylene to Manufacture Acrylic Acid Derivatives,” is financially supported by a $677,925 grant from the Department of Energy through the Chemical and Materials Sciences to Advance Clean Energy Technologies and Low-Carbon Manufacturing funding opportunity.

The funding is part of a $540 million DOE initiative to “Reduce Climate Impacts of Energy Technologies and Manufacturing.”