In this work the etherification reaction of glycerol with isobutene (IB) and tert-butyl alcohol (TBA) has been studied with the aim of preparing mixtures with high content of poly-substituted ethers. The results obtained using solid acid catalysts have shown that the reaction with IB proceeds at a high rate but the formation of undesired di-isobutene (DIB) represents a serious problem when catalysts with high density of acid sites, such as Amberlyst, are used. When using TBA as a reactant, the main problem is the formation of water that, due to thermodynamic reasons, prevents the formation of poly-substituted ethers regardless of the catalyst used. Some preliminary experiments carried out with a water permselective tubular membrane have demonstrated that the yield of poly-substituted ethers significantly increases once water was selectively removed from the reaction medium by recirculation of the gas phase.
Glycerol is a major by-product in the biodiesel production process. Every 100 kg of biodiesel produced generates approximately 10 kg of crude glycerol. As the biodiesel industry has expanded rapidly in recent years, finding new uses of the excess crude glycerol is important. Many studies have examined alternative uses of crude glycerol. One of them is the use of glycerol derivatives, such as glycerol tert-butyl ethers as fuel additives. In this paper, the etherification kinetics of glycerol with tert-butyl alcohol to glycerol tert-butyl ethers was studied using an Amberlyst catalyst. The influences of the catalyst type and loading, reaction time, molar ratio, and temperature were investigated in detail.