Kinetics of heterogeneous solvent-free liquid phase oxidation of alcohol using ZrO2 catalyst with molecular oxygen

Clean liquid phase solvent-free oxidation of alcohol to aldehyde/ketone using ZrO(2) catalyst with molecular oxygen has been studied. Monoclinic phase ZrO(2) has been synthesized and characterized by XRD, SEM, EDX and surface and pore size analyses. Oxidation of alcohol was carried out in a typical batch reactor at different speed of agitation (150 - 1200 r/min), temperature (373 - 413 K), catalyst loading (50 - 300 mg) and partial pressure of oxygen (12 - 101 kPa). These parameters influence alcohol conversion as well as selectivity. A handy touch of kinetics was given to the experimental data and apparent activation energy was calculated.