(40e) Catalysis in Green Chemistry

Sustainability and Environmental benignity has moved increasingly chemistry towards catalysis. The key issue is to develop extremely efficient (high conversions) and selective (minimization of wastes, ease of isolation) catalysts that promote transformation using available and renewable raw materials. In this context, the presentation will be focused on recent advances from our lab on the use of supported gold nanoparticles for pollution remediation, aerobic oxidations and carbon dioxide fixation. The Fenton reaction serves to generate highly aggressive hydroxyl radicals that are able to mineralise virtually any organic compound present in water. Development of a catalyst able to generate hydroxyl radicals at room temperature from hydrogen peroxide constitutes a significant step forward in this area. Also the use of molecular oxygen as oxidizing reagent avoiding stoichiometric transition metals is of large industrial relevance that requires highly active catalysts. Finally, CO2 has considerable advantages as C1 feedstock with respect to other current processes that are now based on CO derived from fossil fuels.