Effective pyrolysis of waste cooking oils into hydrocarbon rich biofuel on novel mesoporous catalyst with acid and alkali coexisting

Abstract The high value usage of waste biomass-based resources is highly demanded. Here we synthesized an acid and base based on SBA-15 bifunctional catalyst, SBA-15@MgO@Zn, for the catalytic pyrolysis of waste cooking oils (WCO) into hydrocarbon rich biofuel with deoxygenation. First, C C bond broke at Lewis acid sites to form hydrocarbons and short-chain fatty acids, and then these short-chain fatty acids deoxidized at the basic sites to form hydrocarbon compounds. Therefore, the acid and base coexist bifunctional catalyst overcomes not only the shortcomings for the acidic catalysts that easily produce coke, but also for the basic catalysts that induces saponification during the catalytic pyrolysis of high acid value WCO. At the same time, this kind of high efficient catalyst makes deoxidation in the process of the pyrolysis, which not only improves the quality of biofuel, but also simplifies the production process.