Boreskov Institute of Catalysis SB RAS, Novosibirsk, Russia

PP-15CaO AND Al 2 O 3 SUPPORT SOLID CATALYSTS FOR BIODIESELPRODUCTIONAna P. Dias 1 , Jaime Puna 2 , João Gomes 2,3 , M. Joana Correia 4 , João Bordado 31 ICEMS, Instituto Superior Técnico (IST-UTL), Lisboa, Portugal, apsoares@ist.utl.pt2 Instituto Superior de Engenharia de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal, jpuna@deq.isel.ipl.pt3 IBB – Institute of Biotechnology and Bioengineering, IST-UTL, Lisboa Portugal4 Centre for Chemical Processes, IST-UTL, Lisboa, PortugalThis paper describes preliminary work done by the authors towards thedevelopment of new metallic heterogeneous catalysts that are intended to be used inthe production of biodiesel. Biodiesel, is a mixture of mono-alkyl esters of fatty acids,and is currently manufactured by transesterification of triglycerides with methanol,using NaOH or KOH as liquid base catalyst. However, an important drawback relatedwith the use of these catalysts is that, the liquid based catalyst has to be neutralizedafter the reaction, thus producing salt streams. Moreover, due to the presence of freefatty acids, it reacts to form soaps as unwanted by-products, hence requiring moreexpensive separation processes. Therefore, there is currently a drive towards thedevelopment of industrial processes for biodiesel production using solid catalysts. Inaddition to lower separation processes costs, the key benefit of using solid acid orbasic catalysts is that, the catalysts don’t have to be removed since they don’t mixwith the biodiesel. This work refers preliminary studies done in these field using CaOand Al 2 O 3 heterogeneous support catalysts, with Li, Sr and Ca as solid precursors.Several analysis techniques were used for catalysts characterization, like MIR, SEM,XRD, TG and BET. The results obtained so far will be presented in this proceeding.References:[1]. Gomes, J.F., Puna, J., Bordado, J.C., Correia, J.N., «Development of heterogeneous catalysts fortransesterification of triglycerides». Reaction Kinetics and Catalysis Letters, 2008, 95(2), 273-279.[2]. Park et. al., «The heterogeneous catalyst system for the continuous conversion of free fatty acidsin used vegetable oils for the production of biodiesel». Catalysis Today, 2008, 131, 238-243.[3]. MacLeod et. al., «Evaluation of the activity and stability of alkali-doped metal oxide catalysts forapplication to an intensified method of biodiesel production». Chemical Engineering Journal,2008, 135, 63-70.[4]. Serio et. al., «Heterogeneous Catalysts for Biodiesel Production». Energy & Fuels, 2008, 22, 207-217.[5]. Huaping et. al., «Preparation of Biodiesel Catalyzed by Solid Super Base of calcium Oxide and ItsRefining Process». Chinese Journal of Catalysis, 2006, 27(5), 391-396.[6]. Xie et. al., «Alumina-supported potassium iodide as a heterogeneous catalyst for biodieselproduction from soybean oil». Journal of Molecular Catalysis A: Chemical, 2006, 255, 1-9.104