Selective synthesis of dimethyl carbonate from urea and methanol over Fe2O3/HMCM-49

Abstract

The supported material Fe₂O₃/HMCM-49 was prepared and characterized by XRD, FT-IR and NH₃-TPD. This material was tested for the catalytic synthesis of dimethyl carbonate (DMC) from methanol and urea in a batch reactor without any specially designed equipment. The results showed that Fe₂O₃/HMCM-49 is an effective catalyst, exhibiting 34.2% conversion of urea and 97.4% selectivity to DMC at 453 K. Furthermore, the catalyst can be recovered due to its heterogeneous nature and reused three times without a significant loss in its activity and the reaction mechanism via mutual activation of urea and methanol was proposed.