Development of an efficient catalyst for the pyrolytic conversion of biomass into transport fuel

Fast pyrolysis is a promising technique to convert biomass into a liquid fuel/fuel precursor, known as bio-oil. However, compared to conventional crude oil, bio-oil has much higher oxygen content which results in various detrimental properties and limits its application. Thus the first part of this thesis aims to develop an efficient catalyst to upgrade bio-oil into high quality fuel via de-oxygenation and hydro-deoxygenation. The second part is dedicated to study the nature of the active specie in the newly-developed catalyst and to gain more insight into the catalytic conversion of lignin via a model compound study.