Recycle and recovery of rhodium complexes with water-soluble and amphiphilic phosphines in ionic liquids for hydroformylation of 1-hexene

Abstract

A biphasic catalysis system composed of ionic liquid and rhodium complexes with water-soluble or amphiphilic phosphine ligands bearing water-soluble groups of sodium sulfonate have been employed for hydroformylation of 1-hexene. The experimental results show that the activity is almost independent of the hydrotropicity of the phosphine ligands in BMI center dot BF4. In this system, the extraction of phosphine species by the organics from the IL phase was quite low but larger than that of rhodium species and showed rather good stability of catalytic activity. A slight decrease in the aldehyde n/i ratio during the catalyst reuse could be recovered, in part, by replenishing certain amount of ligand into the used catalyst system.