Catalytic dehydration of methanol to dimethyl ether over mordenite catalysts

The conversion of methanol to dimethyl ether was carried out over various commercial mordenite and ion-exchanged catalysts to evaluate the catalytic performance of mordenite catalysts with different pore structures and acidities. These catalysts were compared for their catalytic properties in a fixed-bed reactor at 1 atm, 573 K and LHSV of 2.84 h− 1. The catalysts were characterized by BET, ICP, NH3-TPD, XRD, TGA and FT-IR techniques. The ion-exchanged mordenite showed higher activity, selectivity and good stability in dehydration of methanol due to the addition of medium acid sites. Also, the effect of water on catalyst deactivation was investigated over two selected catalysts in order to develop a suitable catalyst for synthesis of dimethyl ether. It was found that the H-mordenite catalyst supplied by Süd-chemie Co., (MCDH-1) was more active and less deactivated than another one in a feed containing 20 wt.% water.