At the beginning preliminary experiments are performed
to identify a suitable homogenous or heterogeneous catalyst. Subsequently a first series of experiments is performed
to determine the required operating conditions. To assess,
whether the esterification reaction of the chosen chemical
reaction system is appropriate for the application of reactive distillation, decisive parameters influencing the reaction
rate and conversion are investigated. For esterification of
long-chain fatty acids the following parameters are identified; reaction temperature, molar ratio of alcohol to fatty acid
and mass fraction of catalyst (Hassan and Vinjamur, 2013;
Lucena et al., 2011). The chosen parameters and their ranges
are listed in Table 3. In this study catalyst mass fractions
ωcatof 0.005 gcatalystgoleic acid
−1
to 0.045 gcatalystgoleic acid
−1
; and
ethanol to oleic acid ratios EtOH/OAcbetween 1:1 and 6:1 are
evaluated.