Epoxidation of Hybrid Oleic Acid-derived Palm Oil Using an In Situ Performic Acid Mechanism

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of different types of catalysts – sulphuric acid titanium dioxide, and Amberlite – and to investigate the effect of catalyst loading (0.1 g, 0.5 g, 1.0 g) on the relative conversion to oxirane (RCO %). This study examines the influence of these different catalyst types and their loadings on the epoxidation of palm oil to identify the optimum conditions for the process. The epoxidised palm oil was analysed using RCO % and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The results showed that 0.5 g sulphuric acid as a catalyst with a loading of 0.5 g achieved the highest RCO % at 76.16 %. FTIR spectra revealed the presence of an epoxy group at 833.10 cm–1. In conclusion, using 0.5 g of sulphuric acid as the catalyst provides the optimum conditions for the epoxidation process.

Keywords

• epoxidation
• palm oil
• biomass conversion
• kinetic model