Methanol carbonylation over copper-modified mordenite zeolite: A solid-state NMR study.

The carbonylation of methanol with carbon monoxide to generate methyl acetate over Cu-H-MOR and H-MOR zeolites is studied using solid-state NMR spectroscopy. It is found that the catalytic activity of Cu-H-MOR zeolite is much higher than that of H-MOR zeolite. The presence of Cu+ species enables the stabilization of dimethyl ether, which efficiently suppresses the hydrocarbon formation during carbonylation process over Cu-H-MOR zeolite. In addition, the carbon monoxide adsorbed on Cu+ site is not an active species to produce either methyl acetate or acetic acid.