Catalytic liquid-phase phenol oxidation over metal oxides and molecular sieves. Reaction kinetics and mechanism

Oxidation of aqueous phenol solutions was studied over various catalysts in a semibatch slurry and continuous-flow fixed-bed reactors at temperatures up to 463 K and pressures slightly above atmospheric. The results show that due to a complex consecutive-parallel reaction pathway and a heterogeneous-homogeneous free-radical mechanism both kinetics and reaction selectivity are strongly dependent on the type of reactor used. Although the catalysts employed were found to be active in converting aqueous phenol solutions to nontoxic compounds, neither metal oxides nor zeolites were stable at the reaction conditions.