AUTHOR=Nayebzadeh Hamed , Haghighi Mohammad , Saghatoleslami Naser , Tabasizadeh Mohammad 

TITLE=Influence of Fuel to Oxidizer Ratio on Microwave-Assisted Combustion Preparation of Nanostructured KOH/Ca12Al14O33 Catalyst Used in Efficient Biodiesel Production

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Energy Research

VOLUME=Volume 8 - 2020

YEAR=2020

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/energy-research/articles/10.3389/fenrg.2020.00106

DOI=10.3389/fenrg.2020.00106

ISSN=2296-598X

ABSTRACT=In this study, microwave-assisted solution combustion method was utilized for fabrication of Ca12Al14O33 as support and the amount of urea as important parameter during synthesis of the sample was assessed. Synthesized Ca12Al14O33 with different fuel amount was impregnated by KOH and used in the biodiesel production process from canola oil under microwave irradiation. The results presented that the crystallinity, crystalline size, surface area and elemental composition of the final nanocatalysts are affected by the fuel amount. Moreover, during impregnation of potassium components, the structure of support was interestingly transformed from CaAl2O4 to Ca12Al14O33 structure due to incorporation of potassium in alumina lattice and more diffusion of calcium cations into support lattice. On the other hands, when the amount of fuel passed the optimum amount (2 times of stoichiometric amount), the crystallinity was reduced due to formation high amount of smoke during combustion and prevention the entry of air (oxygen) into the system. The results of microwave-enhanced transesterification reaction confirmed the results of analyses that the conversion of 94.5% was obtained using optimum sample at 450 W, 12 molar ratios of methanol/oil, 4 wt.% catalyst and 60 min reaction time. According to the stability of the optimum sample (at least three times (>75%)) along with its unique mesoporous structure, uniformly dispersion of potassium components and high basicity sites, it can consider as a comparable solid base nanocatalyst for biodiesel production.