Liquid-liquid equilibria in ternary mixtures of methyl oleate + ethanol + glycerol at atmospheric pressure

Abstract

The knowledge and the ability to describe the phase equilibrium behavior of systems composed of transesterification products are very important in the optimization of biodiesel production and purification process. In this work, liquid-liquid equilibrium data have been measured for the ternary system methyl oleate + ethanol + glycerol, at temperatures between 303 and 333 K. This system has not been explored before. The experimental data measured were compared with analogous ternary systems showing an increasing of the solubility regarding the systems containing methanol. The isothermal experimental data have shown a good linear fit in an Othmer-Tobias plot. The group contribution with association GCA-EoS equation of state and the A-UNIFAC model were applied to represent the phase equilibria of this ternary system. The GCA-EoS model in particular, has shown a good predictive capability.