Melnyk Y. Scientific Foundations of Higher Fatty Acids Esters Technologies

The dissertation is devoted to the development of scientific foundations and the technology of higher fatty acids esters. The regularities of higher fatty acids esters obtaining by triglycerides transesterification and higher fatty acids esterification with C2–C4 alcohols have been established. It is shown that the metal oxides activity in the transesterification reaction is due to the presence of weak acid sites and increases with an increase in the surface acidity of the investigated metal oxides. It is shown that the highest activity in the transesterification reaction is exhibited by catalysts containing ions of zinc, nickel and tin. The optimal conditions for the use of the investigated catalysts are established. The effect of conditions on the technological parameters of the transesterification process, in particular on the triglycerides conversion and the reactor specific productivity of higher fatty acids esters, is studied. It is proposed to carry out the acids extraction from the soapstock with the head fraction of ethyl alcohol, followed by esterification of obtained extract catalyzed with p-toluenesulfonic acid. The industrial testing of research results has been carried out, in particular, obtaining a pilot batch of n-propyl and ethyl esters of higher fatty acids by sunflower oil transesterification. The possibility of re-use of metal oxides and cation exchange resin KU-2-8 with immobilized metal ions as the transesterification reaction catalysts is shown.