Oxidation of Catechol using Titanium Silicate (TS-1) Catalyst: Modeling and Optimization

The oxidation of catechol was studied in an eco-friendly process with commercial titanium silicate-1 (TS-1) catalyst and hydrogen peroxide as oxidant in absence of all mass transfer effects. The process was optimized by Box-Behnken design in terms of three independent process variables such as reaction temperature, moles of hydrogen peroxide per mole of catechol and catalyst amount whose optimum values of the process variables were found to be 60 °C, 13.2 and 1.24 g respectively for maximum conversion of 75.8 %. The effects of different process parameters such as mole ratio of hydrogen peroxide to catechol, catalyst particle size, catalyst amount, temperature and reaction time were studied. A pseudo first order kinetic model was fitted with the experimental rate data. The apparent activation energy for the reaction was found to be 11.37 kJ/mole.