Studies of Metal Sulfides for Ethanol Carbonylation to Propionates

Metal sulfides are explored for iodide-free carbonylation of ethanol to propionates, a potential route to methacrylates which are used in commodity thermoplastics. Molybdenum based sulfides outperform other transition metals in both conversion of ethanol and yield of propionates. Material characterization data is correlated to reaction productivities.