A novel solid phosphoric acid from rice hull ash for olefinic alkylation of thiophenic sulfur in gasoline

•A novel solid phosphoric acid was prepared from rice hull ash.•The solid phosphoric acid shows high surface area and acid density.•The solid acid is an excellent catalyst for thiophene alkylation reaction.

ABSTRACTA novel solid phosphoric acid (SPA) was prepared from rice hull ash by impregnation with phosphoric acid and followed by calcination. The characterization results reveal that the solid phosphoric acid exhibits high surface area (335 m2/g) and acid densities (1.25 mmol/g) compared with commercial SPA catalyst. It was also clearly confirmed that silicon phosphate and silicon pyrophosphate were formed by the reaction of silica with phosphoric acid during the calcination process. The OATS catalytic performance results indicate that the solid phosphoric acid shows very good activity for thiophene alkylation reaction. This research provided a promising way to synthesis high active solid phosphoric acid for OATS desulfurization application.

Graphical abstractA novel solid phosphoric acid was prepared from rice hull ash by impregnation with phosphoric acid and followed by calcination. The characterization results from XRD, FT-IR, solid-state NMR and SEM reveal that the solid phosphoric acid exhibits high surface area and acid densities compared with commercial SPA catalyst. The OATS catalytic performance results indicate that the solid phosphoric acid shows excellent activity for thiophene alkylation reaction.Figure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slide