Preparation of bimodal mesoporous silica containing cerious salt and its application as catalyst for the synthesis of biodiesel by esterification

Abstract

A kind of bimodal mesoporous silica catalyst modified with ammonium cerous sulfate (ACS/BMMS) was synthesized and applied in the esterification of free fatty acid and alcohol. The characterization results including XRD, N2 adsorption and desorption, FTIR, 29Si-NMR and TEM showed that ACS/BMMS has orderly arranged bimodal mesopores, the small mesopore diameter is about 4.0–6.0 nm and the large mesopore diameter is in the range of 7.0–9.0 nm. The chemical interaction existed between silica group Si (OH)2(OSi)2 and the NH4+, SO42− and Ce-O groups of cerious salt. When the loading is not more than 10%, cerious salt dispersed finely on the supports. Oleic acid and methanol were used as the raw material of probe reaction; ACS/BMMS had significantly better activity than the ACS/SBA-15, ACS/SBA-16, ACS/MCM-41, BMMS and bulk ACS. The optimum loading of ACS is 10%, the optimum reaction conditions are reaction temperature 140 °C, reaction time 2 h, mole ratio of methanol to oleic acid 2.0 and the dosage of catalyst 4.0%, in above situation the conversion of oleic acid is about 94.0%, the reusability of ACS/BMMS is much better than bulk ACS. The kinetic study showed that the esterification of oleic acid and methanol on ACS/BMMS match Eley–Rideal model very well.