Recent advances in vegetable oil based fine chemicals and polymers

Abstract

Vegetable oil as a kind of renewable resource has been considered as promising raw material to replace petrochemical resources. This article focuses on several highly reactive sites of triglycerides, including carbon-carbon double bonds, allyl groups, and ester groups. The vegetable oil-based platform monomers/polymers with different structures and functions are obtained via chemical modification such as epoxidation, ozone decomposition, hydroformylation, transesterification and thiolene. Vegetable oil-based chemicals mainly include polyols, biodiesel fuels, lubricants and plasticizers, and vegetable oil-based polymers mainly include inks, coatings and polyurethane foams. This paper summarizes and analyzes the review of vegetable oil-based chemicals and polymers in various industries, and puts forward the prospect for their future applications.