The efficiency of two processes to remove the potassium methoxide catalyst after the chemical interesterification of sunflower oil with methyl acetate was examined in this work. The two processes were acid neutralization and dry washing. Several acids were used as neutralization agents to form potassium salts. Among them, phosphoric acid produced the best results, forming monopotassium phosphate salt as a neutralization product. The influence of the acid to catalyst molar ratio was also studied, determining the final water content to avoid a contamination of subsequent methyl acetate purification processes. Several commercial adsorbents (Filtracel, Magnesol, and bentonite) were used in the potassium removal using dry washing. An initial filtration of the undissolved catalyst improved the adsorption process. The experimental results were modeled using a type III Brunauer isotherm. With the dry washing, the partially esterified glycerol content was not affected, but surprisingly, the water content was increased, due to the humidity of the adsorbent.

中文翻译：

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葵花油与乙酸甲酯化学酯交换后的催化剂去除

在这项工作中，考察了向日葵油与乙酸甲酯进行化学酯交换后，两种方法除去甲醇钾催化剂的效率。这两个过程是酸中和和干洗。几种酸被用作中和剂以形成钾盐。其中，磷酸效果最好，形成磷酸一钾盐作为中和产物。还研究了酸与催化剂摩尔比的影响，确定了最终的水含量，以避免污染后续的乙酸甲酯纯化工艺。几种商业吸附剂（Filtracel，Magnesol和膨润土）用于干法除钾。初始过滤未溶解的催化剂改善了吸附过程。实验结果是使用III型Brunauer等温线建模的。通过干洗涤，部分酯化的甘油含量没有受到影响，但是令人惊讶的是，由于吸附剂的湿度，水含量增加了。