A Mechanistic Change Results in 100 Times Faster CH Functionalization for Ethane versus Methane by a Homogeneous Pt Catalyst

The selective, oxidative functionalization of ethane, a significant component of shale gas, to products such as ethylene or ethanol at low temperatures and pressures remains a significant challenge. Herein we report that ethane is efficiently and selectively functionalized to the ethanol ester of H2SO4, ethyl bisulfate (EtOSO3H) as the initial product, with the PtII “Periana-Catalytica” catalyst in 98% sulfuric acid. A subsequent organic reaction selectively generates isethionic acid bisulfate ester (HO3S-CH2-CH2-OSO3H, ITA). In contrast to the modest 3–5 times faster rate typically observed in electrophilic CH activation of higher alkanes, ethane CH functionalization was found to be ∼100 times faster than that of methane. Experiment and quantum-mechanical calculations reveal that this unexpectedly large increase in rate is the result of a fundamentally different catalytic cycle in which ethane CH activation (and not platinum oxidation as for methane) is now turnover limiting. Facile PtII-Et functionalization was determined to occur via a low energy β-hydride elimination pathway (which is not available for methane) to generate ethylene and a PtII-hydride, which is then rapidly oxidized by H2SO4 to regenerate PtII-X2. A rapid, non-Pt-catalyzed reaction of formed ethylene with the hot, concentrated H2SO4 solvent cleanly generate EtOSO3H as the initial product, which further reacts with the H2SO4 solvent to generate ITA.