Selective conversion of glycerol to acetol over sodium-doped metal oxide catalysts

Glycerol conversion to produce 1-hydroxypropan-2-one (acetol) has been investigated over 5wt.% Na-doped on CeO2, Al2O3, ZrO2 and Ga2O3. The observed performance demonstrates that the 5wt.% Na-doped CeO2 is one of the best catalysts to exhibit high conversion and high selectivity for acetol formation among catalysts tested in this work. XRD patterns of Na-doped catalysts showed that no alteration of metal oxide phases was observed after sodium doping. Temperature-programmed desorption (TPD) of CO2 and NH3 show the optimum number of base and acid sites on 5wt.% Na-doped CeO2.