Mesostructured graphitic carbon nitride as a new base catalyst for the efficient synthesis of dimethyl carbonate by transesterification

Mesostructured graphitic carbon nitride (CN-MCF) material has been prepared using carbon tetrachloride and ethylenediamine as precursors and mesocellular silica foam as a hard template, and characterized by XRD, N2 adsorption–desorption, TEM, FT-IR, and XPS techniques. The material was employed as a catalyst for the production of dimethyl carbonate (DMC) via transesterification of ethylene carbonate (EC) with methanol (MeOH). The influences of reaction conditions, including time, temperature, and the molar ratios of MeOH to EC, on the catalytic performance have been investigated in detail. Catalytic results revealed that CN-MCF could catalyze the transesterification reaction with high efficiency, affording a high DMC yield of 78% and stable catalytic activity for several running cycles. Furthermore, a possible reaction mechanism for the g-CN-catalyzing transesterification of EC with MeOH has been proposed.