Synthesis and characterization of new solketal alkylesters usable as diesel biobased fuel additives

Abstract

There are described experimental studies on the esterification of solketal, (the cyclic acetal produced from glycerol and acetone reaction), by transesterification reactions of the -OH group with methyl esters of C3 - C10aliphatic acids (propionic, pentanoic, hexanoic, octanoic and decanoic). The goal was to obtain better additives for diesel and biodiesel fuels, as compared to solketal. The measured physical properties (especially density, viscosity and water solubility) of the synthesized solketal esters, closer to the corresponding ones for the diesel and biodiesel fuels, permit to suppose that these new compounds should be better additives for diesel type fuels, as compared with solketal. For three of these esters there were studied the liquid-vapor equilibrium at different temperatures, determining also the Antoine equation coefficients for the calculation of vapor pressure.