Reaction Kinetics for Dehydrogenation of Decahydroquinoline to Quinoline for Hydrogen Generation

ABSTRACT Catalytic dehydrogenation of decahydroquinoline (DHQ) to quinoline is a promising pathway for hydrogen release in liquid organic hydrogen carrier systems. In this work, solvent‐free DHQ dehydrogenation over Pd/Al 2 O 3 is systematically investigated to evaluate hydrogen release performance and reaction kinetics. High DHQ conversion (83.9%) and degree of dehydrogenation (82.7%) are achieved at optimal reaction conditions. A power‐law kinetic model based on a simplified reaction mechanism is developed and simulated using a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) approach for estimation of rate constants and validation of concentration profiles with experimental data. The apparent activation energies are determined to be 45.85 kJ/mol for DHQ to 5,6,7,8‐tetrahydroquinoline (bz‐THQ) and 185.43 kJ/mol for bz‐THQ to quinoline formation, identifying latter as the rate‐limiting step. This framework provides mechanistic insight and supports the potential of DHQ as an efficient hydrogen carrier.