Microwave-assisted direct synthesis of butene from high-selectivity methane

Methane was directly converted to butene liquid fuel by microwave-induced non-oxidative catalytic dehydrogenation under 0.1–0.2 MPa. The results show that, under microwave heating in a two-stage fixed-bed reactor, in which nickel powder and NiO(x)–MoO(y)/SiO(2) are used as the catalyst, the methane–hydrogen mixture is used as the raw material, with no acetylene detected. The methane conversion is more than 73.2%, and the selectivity of methane to butene is 99.0%. Increasing the hydrogen/methane feed volume ratio increases methane conversion and selectivity. Gas chromatography/electron impact ionization/mass spectrometry chromatographic analysis showed that the liquid fuel produced by methane dehydrogenation oligomerization contained 89.44% of butene, and the rest was acetic acid, ethanol, butenol and butyric acid, and the content was 1.0–3.0 wt%.