Mixed carbon length synthesis of primary guerbet alcohols
AssigneeChevron U.S.A. Inc.
InventorsVaradarjan Dwarakanath, Robert Shong
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Abstract
In an embodiment of the disclosure, mixtures of different carbon length alcohols are used as the primary feedstock for Guerbet alcohols. Specifically, embodiments relate to a method of synthesizing mixed molecular weight surfactants from a mixture of primary alcohols comprising, receiving a mixture of primary alcohols comprising at least two different chain length primary alcohols and reacting the mixture of primary alcohols to produce a mixture of Guerbet alcohols. The mixture of Guerbet alcohols is then used to produce a surfactant composition comprising surfactants of different molecular weights.
Claims9
A method of synthesizing mixed chain length surfactants from a mixture of primary alcohols, the method comprising:
- receiving a mixture of primary alcohols comprising greater than two different chain length primary alcohols in equal parts of each primary alcohol;
- reacting in a single reactor the mixture of primary alcohols to produce a mixture of at least five Guerbet alcohols having different molecular weights wherein:
- i. the number of Guerbet alcohols produced is equal to twice the number of primary alcohols minus one;
- ii. the mixture of at least five Guerbet alcohols comprises a lowest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol, a highest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol, a Guerbet alcohol having a molecular weight halfway between the molecular weight of the lowest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol and the highest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol;
- iii. the Guerbet alcohol having the molecular weight halfway between the molecular weight of the lowest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol and the highest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol has a highest concentration of the Guerbet alcohols in the mixture of at least five Guerbet alcohols;
- iv. the lowest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol and the highest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol each have a lowest concentration of the Guerbet alcohols in the mixture of at least five Guerbet alcohols;
- and
- v. remaining Guerbet alcohols in the mixture of at least five Guerbet alcohols have concentrations increasing as molecular weight approaches the molecular weight halfway between the molecular weight of the lowest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol and the highest molecular weight Guerbet alcohol and decreasing as molecular weight approaches the lowest and the highest molecular weight Guerbet alcohols;
- and
- producing a surfactant composition from the mixture of greater than two Guerbet alcohols;
- wherein the mixture of primary alcohols is derived from a natural source selected from the group consisting of palm oil, algal oil, canola oil, castor bean oil, coconut oil, corn oil, cotton oil, fish oil, flaxseed oil, hempseed oil, jatropha oil, lard, mustard seed oil, nut oil, olive oil, palm kernel oil, peanut oil, rapeseed oil, safflower seed oil, soybean oil, sunflower oil, tall oil, tallow, yellow grease, and any oil produced by using the following:
- bacteria, yeast, fungi, unicellular organisms, multicellular organisms or a combination thereof;
- wherein the reacting the mixture of primary alcohols to produce the mixture of greater than two Guerbet alcohols is stopped when a Guerbet alcohol conversion of at least 80% is obtained;
- and
- wherein unreacted primary alcohols are removed from the mixture of greater than two Guerbet alcohols.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.