Melero, J.A.Morales, G.Iglesias, J.Paniagua, M.Hernández, B.Penedo, S.2013-09-062013-09-062013J.A. Melero, G. Morales, J. Iglesias, M. Paniagua, B. Hernández, S. Penedo. Efficient conversion of levulinic acid into alkyl levulinates catalyzed by sulfonic mesostructured silicas. Applied Catalysis A: General 466 (2013) 116¿ 1220926-860Xhttp://hdl.handle.net/10115/11811Línea Investigación: Línea 8. Producción de biocombustiblesSulfonic mesoporous silicas have demonstrated an outstanding catalytic performance in the esterification of levulinic acid with different alcohols to produce alkyl levulinates, a family of chemicals considered to be excellent oxygenated fuel extenders for gasoline, diesel and biodiesel. Catalyst screening indicated that propylsulfonic acid-modified SBA-15 material was the most active one, among tested materials, due to a combination of moderately strong sulfonic acid sites with relative high surface hydrophobicity. Under optimized reaction conditions (T = 117 ºC, ethanol/levulinic acid molar ratio = 4.86/1 and catalyst/levulinic acid = 7 wt.% ) almost 100% of levulinic acid conversion was achieved after 2 h of reaction, being negligible the presence of levulinic acid by-products or ethers coming from intermolecular dehydration of alcohols. The catalyst has been reused, without any regeneration treatment, up to three times keeping almost the high initial activity. Interestingly, a close catalytic performance to that achieved using ethanol has been obtained with bulkier alcohols.engAtribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 3.0 Españahttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/Químicasulfonic acidslevulinic acidalkyl levulinatesfuel formulationacid catalysisinfo:eu-repo/semantics/article10.1016/j.apcata.2013.06.035info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess2391 Química Ambiental