Fabrication of magnetic nanoparticles supported ionic liquid catalyst for transesterification of vegetable oil to produce biodiesel

In the present study, we have fabricated novel magnetic ionic liquid based nanocomposites using 1-butylimidazole, (3-bromopropyl)-trimethoxysilane and NiFe2O4 nanoparticles. [NiFe2O4@-BMSI]HSO4 was synthesized from [NiFe2O4@-BMSI]Br via ion-exchange process. The fabricated nanocomposites were characterized by various analytical techniques. The surface area was determined using N-2 adsorption-desorption analysis and the BET surface area of [NiFe2O4@BMSI]Br and [NiFe2O4@BMSI]HSO4 was noted to be 89.21 and 87.21 m(2)/g, respectively. The fabricated nanocomposites were used as catalyst for the transesterification of palm oil (VO) for the production of biodiesel. The results revealed that [NiFe2O4@BMSI]HSO4 exhibited better performance in terms of biodiesel yield; a maximum i.e. 86.4% yield was obtained using [NiFe2O4@BMSI]HSO4 while in the case of NiFe2O4@BMSI]Br, about similar to 74.6% yield was found with 5% (w/w) catalyst loading, 353 K and to CH3OH ratio of 1:12 in 8 h. The reusability of the catalyst results revealed that the catalytic activity of the catalysts still remained about 92.7% and 88.1% with NiFe2O4@BMSI]HSO4 and NiFe2O4@BMSI]Br, respectively after six cycles which may be accredited to the handling loss during the manipulation process. (C) 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.