Title
Experimental and theoretical analysis revealing the underlying chemistry accounting for the heterogeneous transesterification reaction in Na<inf>2</inf>SiO<inf>3</inf> and Li<inf>2</inf>SiO<inf>3</inf> catalysts
Date Issued
01 January 2022
Access level
metadata only access
Resource Type
journal article
Author(s)
Mijangos G.E.
Cuautli C.
Romero-Ibarra I.C.
Vazquez-Arenas J.
Santes V.
Castañeda-Galván A.A.
Pfeiffer H.
Instituto Politécnico Nacional
Publisher(s)
Elsevier Ltd
Abstract
The influence of sodium and lithium content in the metasilicate crystal structure (SiO32−) is herein analyzed concerning the heterogeneous transesterification reaction for biodiesel production. Na2SiO3 and Li2SiO3 were characterized structurally and microstructurally. The catalyst content was evaluated between 1 and 5 wt %, where the maximum conversions to FAME (∼99%) were obtained using 3 wt % of Na2SiO3 during 1 h at 65 °C. After some cyclic experiments, it was determined that Na2SiO3 possesses a better stability and consequently reutilization capacity than Li2SiO3 in terms of its triglycerides conversion to FAME. DFT calculations were then used to analyze these experimental differences, revealing significant differences between these two catalysts in terms of energy, geometrical configuration, and electronic structure. It was found that three active sites are required on both catalytic surfaces to overcome the methanol deprotonation, which is herein suggested as the rate-controlling step of the entire transesterification mechanism. In one site, the oxygen atom of methanol approaches, while Lewis acid and Brønsted base sites are needed for the methoxide anion stabilization and proton stabilization, respectively.
Start page
845
End page
856
Volume
184
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Química inorgánica, Química nuclear
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85121014466
Source
Renewable Energy
ISSN of the container
09601481
Sources of information: Directorio de Producción Científica Scopus