Innovative Application of Kolbe Reaction on Constituents of Plant Oils

This work presents the conversion of single and mixture of fatty acids (1:1) into defined chemical products using an electrolysis technique. Lauric acid and palmitic acid are used as substrates as both acids are principal constituents of different vegetable oils like coconut oil and palm oil. The impact of operating parameters such as current intensity (10 mA–100 mA), amount of KOH (0.4–1.7 eq.), electrolysis time (2–18 h), and different solvent environments on the process performance has been investigated in terms of chemicals production, especially focusing on the dimers yield. The achieved results show 65% and 23% of the dimers yield from the electrolysis of lauric acid and palmitic acid respectively, with nearly full dissociation of substrate acids, at 70 mA current intensity with alternate polarity of 30 minutes, 1.5 eq. of KOH, 6 h of electrolysis time in EtOH:MeOH:H2O solvent system. Whereas, using the same experimental conditions, the mixture of both acids (1:1) shows 45% of the dimers including n-docosane and n-triacontane as homocoupling and n-hexacosane as hetero-coupling, with nearly fully dissociation of acid substrate.