Sustainable synthesis of MFI zeolite and derived metal-acid bifunctional catalysts for hydroisomerization of n-heptane

Developing sustainable synthesis method of versatile zeolites to overcome the shortcoming of traditional process is of significant for development of green chemistry and environmentally friendly techniques. In this work, MFI zeolite (ZSM-5) was synthesized through organotemplate-, solvent- and seed-free sustainable process comprising physical grinding and quasi-solid state crystallization and utilizing commercial silica gel or Stöber colloidal SiO₂ as silica source. The key influencing factors to this sustainable synthesis process, such as starting material composition, crystallization temperature and time, had been unambiguously investigated by combining a series of characterization techniques. It is revealed that the starting material with SiO₂/Al₂O₃ and Na₂O/SiO₂ at 30–40 and 0.072, respectively, is suitable to obtain zeolite product with high crystallinity. The presence of right amount of water (or alcohol) is also crucial. In addition, this green synthesis method can be extended into the fabrication of encapsulated metal-zeolite bifunctional catalyst, which is effective in hydroisomerization of n-heptane. These results are instructive for development of sustainable synthesis of aluminosilicate zeolites and derived heterogeneous catalysts.