Unique capability of NdPO4 to activate hydrogen for efficient hydrogenation of furfural to furfuryl alcohol over Nd-Co-P composites

Efficient and applicable catalysts are highly desirable for advanced biomass transformation industry, here, we fabricated a series of Nd-Co-P catalysts for hydrogenation of furfural (FAL) to furfuryl alcohol (FOH). By comprehensive characterizations, it is demonstrated that the prepared Nd-Co-P samples are structured as (NdPO 4 ) m /Co 2 P nanocomposites with molar ratio ( m ) in range of 0.24–1.1; by manipulating m , the outstanding catalytic efficiency comparable with the performance of precious metal catalysts , such as turnover frequency (TOF) up to 0.50 s −1 (being ten-fold higher than Co 2 P) and FOH yield up to 97%, is achieved on the reusable (NdPO 4 ) m /Co 2 P composites. Temperature programmed desorption (TPD), in-situ infrared spectroscopy (IR) and kinetic-mechanism studies further disclose that Co 2 P is decisive for activating FAL, instead, NdPO 4 possesses unique capability of activating hydrogen which readily facilitate the selective hydrogenation of FAL to FOH through a rapid Langmuir–Hinshelwood process over (NdPO 4 ) m /Co 2 P catalyst. These results indicate that rare-earth phosphates like NdPO 4 can act as the promising and reliable catalytic component to activate hydrogen, which can be of interest not only for innovating novel and applicable non-metallic catalysts for sustainable biomass transformation analogous to hydrogenation of FAL, but also for expanding material base for other green mass transformation techniques involving hydrogen.