Effect of Preparation Parameters on the Catalytic Performance of Solid Acid Catalyst SO42-/ZrO2-CeO2 in Biodiesel Production

A new solid acid catalyst SO42-/ZrO2-CeO2 (SZC) was prepared by co-precipitation method and used in biodiesel production. Different from considering several parameters in available literatures, the effect of all 10 parameters in the preparation process on the catalytic activities of SZC were studied systematically and comprehensively. The catalytic performance was tested by the conversion of Jatropha oil fatty acids (CFA) in esterification. TG, XRD, BET, TEM, NH3-TPD, FTIR were used to characterize the catalyst aiming to analyze the influence mechanisms of each factor. The results indicated that the surface area and acidity of sulfated zirconia increased by doping of Ce. The most important preparation parameters included loading amounts of CeO2, aging time, and calcination temperature, their proper values were 5%, 21 h, 773 K, respectively. Moreover, novel findings included: the ammonia concentration influences the acid strength of catalyst which was more important than the amount of acid sites for the catalytic activities and drying before calcination was a necessary step.