THERMO-CHEMICALLY TUNING OF ACTIVE BASIC SITES ON NANOARCHITECTURED SILICA FOR BIODIESEL PRODUCTION

E. SÁNCHEZ-FABA; G.O. FERRERO; JOANA MAIA DIAS; EIMER, GRISELDA A.

Molecular Catalyst

El sevier

Año: 2018

2468-8231

In the design of catalysts, an extremely important point is to determine, control and increasethe availability of active sites on the surface. In the present work, active sodium oxide specieshave been identified and it is demonstrated how its dispersion can be suitably improved bycombining sodium loading degree and calcination heating rate in order to increase the catalystbasic character and consequently, its performance. The different synthesized materials werecharacterized by: small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), high angle X-ray diffractions (XRD),atomic absorption spectroscopy (AA), BET method (specific surface determination), Fouriertransform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), carbon dioxide temperature programed desorption (CO2 TPD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The obtained catalyst using 10 wt% ofsodium loading followed by calcination at 500C, employing an 8C/min heating rate, showedthe highest activity towards the transesterification of sunflower oil reaction (5 h, 60C, 14:1methanol to oil molar ratio, 2 wt% catalyst, vigorous magnetic stirring), achieving a 90%biodiesel yield.