Analysis of Products Obtained in Chemical Interesterification of Rapeseed Oil with Methyl Formate

Abstract

Chemical interesterification is one possible way to produce biofuel from vegetable oils. Rapeseed oil interesterification with methyl formate using 1M tBuOK catalyst in tBuOH yields product in two layers. The upper layer contains fatty acid esters. Analysis of lower layer by 13C NMR method shows that it contains glycerol and glycerol formates. To develop quantitative determination methods using HPLC and GC, glycerol formates are synthesized in Fisher esterification reaction and used as standards. HPLC analysis is fast, but suitable only for determination of diformin and triformin. GC analysis gives content for all components but is more time consuming.