In November 1989, the Laboratory was approved by the State Planning Commission to establish. In July 1992, the Laboratory was open to the outside while still in construction. In July 1995, having passed the acceptance check by the state, the Laboratory was officially brought into the list of state key laboratories. The Laboratory passed the national assessment of chemical laboratories in September 1999, July 2004 and 2009 successively. In October 1999, the Laboratory was included into the Pilot Project of the Knowledge Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.　

Against the background of the optimization and comprehensive utilization of resources and adopting the catalytic process of oxo synthesis and selective oxidation as its main means, the Laboratory carries out prospective applied basic and strategic high-tech research on catalytic chemistry in the fields of chemical engineering, energy resource, material and environment, through the interrelations of chemical catalysis and biocatalysis, surface catalysis and interfacial catalysis, heterogeneous catalysis and homogeneous catalysis.