Advances in solid acid catalysts for biodiesel production

Heterogeneous solid acid catalysts have attracted much attention for biodiesel production owing to their significant advantages of easy separation from product and no equipment corrosion, nontoxicity and environment-friendly. The recent development of solid acid catalysts for their application in biodiesel production is reviewed, including zeolites, heteropolyacids, sulfonic ion-exchange resins, SO42-/MxOy superacids and metal phosphates, as well as new-developed organic-inorganic hybrid phosphonates and sulfonated carbon-based acids. The state-of-art and the possible problems of these solid acid catalysts in the esterification and transesterification for biodiesel production were elaborated, and the prospects of these solid acid catalysts were also presented. ©, 2015, Science Press. All right reserved.