High Catalytic Activity of a Seawater Fly Ash Based Zeolite for Phenol Alkylation

Zeolites have been used as catalysts and high cation-exchange materials because of their suitable structure, uniform pore size and high cation-exchange capacity. In this paper, type X zeolites synthesized from fly ash were employed as substrates for developing catalysts with improved performance. With the aim to determine potential application of synthetic products in catalysis, zeolites (with different values of BET surface area) were tested in the gas-phase as basic catalysts for phenol alkylation using diethyl carbonate as an innovative alkylating agents. The results indicate that the newly-formed zeolites are very selective for the O-ethylation of phenol also at higher temperature. The catalytic activity of the zeolites synthesized from fly ash gives high yields, is clean, cost effective, environmentally friendly which make the fly ash-based zeolites efficient catalysts and alternatives for industrial applications.