Mitigation of fouling of skeletal copper catalysts for the gas-phase hydrogenolysis of methyl formate to methanol by addition of chromia

The addition of chromia on skeletal copper catalysts has been investigated for the gas-phase hydrogenolysis of methyl formate to methanol by leaching a CuAl2 alloy in the presence of sodium chromate. The presence of chromia greatly reduced skeletal copper catalyst deactivation although at the expense of some loss of activity if the chromia content was high. The differences in rates of deactivation were interpreted in terms of deposition of a foulant according to first-order kinetics based on parallel deactivation. Optimal residual activity was obtained by adding ca. 1.5 wt.% of chromia to skeletal copper during the process of leaching.