Turning phosphatizing wastewater into zinc-incorporated aluminophosphate molecular sieve with an enhanced catalytic performance

•Zinc and phosphate containing wastewater was used to synthesize molecular sieve.•94% of zinc and phosphate were removed from wastewater after synthesis.•Synthesized molecular sieve showed catalytic activity in oxidizing 80% of cyclohexane.

Zinc-incorporated aluminophosphate molecular sieve (ZnAPO-34) has been successfully synthesized from Zn-contained phosphatizing wastewater. More than 90% of Zn and P were removed from wastewater after synthesis. The synthesized materials were characterized by X-ray diffraction, small angle X-ray diffraction and ammonia temperature programmed desorption. As a result, these samples were proven to be typical ZnAPO-34, which possessed mesoporous structure together with a great number of Brønsted and Lewis acid sites. Furthermore, the synthesized ZnAPO-34 showed 80% catalytic activity and 80% selectivity in cyclohexane oxidation to cyclohexanol. The higher activity and selectivity could be ascribed to the incorporation of Zn in the aluminophosphate molecular sieve.

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