Supported vanadium dihalide-ether complex catalyst
AssigneePhillips Petroleum Company
InventorsPaul D. Smith, Joel L. Martin
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A vanadium dichloride-ether complex is carried on a porous support. This complex can be produced by either forming VCl.sub.2 and thereafter complexing the material with an ether or forming an ether complex with VCl.sub.4 or VCl.sub.3 and thereafter reducing the vanadium compound to VCl.sub.2. It is also possible to carry out the complexing reaction and the reduction essentially simultaneously. The resulting catalyst in combination with a cocatalyst is capable of giving high activity in olefin polymerization and demonstrates good sensitivity to molecular weight control agents, thus allowing the production of a broad spectrum of polymers so far as molecular weight is concerned.
Claims17
A polymerization process comprising:
- contacting at least one mono-1-olefin having 2-8 carbon atoms with a catalyst composition consisting essentially of a vanadium dihalide-ether complex on a solid porous carrier in the presence of an organometal compound wherein said vanadium dihalide-ether complex is chosen from the group consisting of VCl.sub.2.ZnCl.sub.2.2THF, VCl.sub.2.ZnCl.sub.2.4THF and 2VCl.sub.2.ZnCl.sub.2.6THF.
A method according to claim 12 wherein said carrier is selected from at least one of silica, aluminum phosphate, phosphated alumina, and alumina.
A polymerization process comprising:
- contacting at least one mono-1-olefin having 2 to 8 carbon atoms with a catalyst composition consisting essentially of a vanadium dihalide-ether complex on a solid porous carrier in the presence of a vanadium dihalide-ether complex on a solid porous carrier in the presence of an organometal compound wherein said vanadium dihalide-ether complex on a solid porous carrier is produced by contacting a cyclic ether with a vanadium compound selected from VX.sub.4 and VX.sub.3 where X is a halogen to form a first complex;
- contacting sad first complex with a reducing agent at least part of which is selected from zinc metals and organozinc compounds to reduce the valence of said vanadium to +2 and;
- combining the thus produced VX.sub.2 -ether-zinc complex with said porous support.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.