Synthesis of High-Stability Acidic β/Al-MCM-41 and the Catalytic Performance for the Esterification of Oleic Acid

With the increasingly serious in the energy shortage and environmental problems, biodiesel has been widely studied as a kind of non toxic fuel for renewable and easily biodegradable. Among all kinds of biodiesels, fatty acid ester, obtained from the esterification of oleic acid with alcohol, has received greater attention using as biofuel in recent years [1] [2]. This kind of biodiesel has the advantages of ready raw materials, simple production process and high calorific value [3]-[5]. In industry, liquid sulfuric acid was used as catalyst to produce fatty acid ester [6]. However, the traditional catalysts have shortcomings including serious corrosion of equipment, complicated separation procedures, serious environmental problems and byproducts because of strong oxidizing property. These greatly restricted the wide application of fatty acid ester. Therefore, Abstract