Transesterification of soybean oil to biodiesel using modified zeolites (Y and Clinoptilolite) as a solid base catalyst

One of the alternative fuels that is a kind of biofuels is biodiesel, Monoesters produced by the transesterification of vegetable oils with short chain alcohol. In this work, the transesterification of soybean oil with methanol has been studied using modified zeolites such as Y, A and clinoptilolite as natural zeolite. Reaction parameters were optimized for the production of biodiesel. The biodiesel products were analyzed by GC and GC-MS. The conversion was 98.4% and 86.9% for zeolite Y and clinoptilolite, respectively, with 100% selectivity toward the biodiesel formation under the optimum reaction conditions.

کلیدواژه ها:

biofuel ، biodiesel ، transesterification ، solid catalyst ، zeolite