Catalytic conversion of duckweed to methyl levulinate in the presence of acidic ionic liquids.

Highlights • An efficient strategy is provided for methyl levulinate production from duckweed. • Dual functionalized IL [C 3 H 6 SO 3 HPy]HSO 4 is effective for duckweed conversion. • 88.0% conversion and 73.7% methyl levulinate yield are shown at 170 °C for 5 h. • Duckweed liquefaction and methyl levulinate yield are highly temperature dependent. • Solvent has an obvious intensified effect on process efficiency via esterification. Abstract In this study, an efficient strategy is proposed for selective methyl levulinate production from duckweed, a typical fast-growing aquatic microalgae in warm and humid regions, in the presence of acidic ionic liquids (ILs). The results show that IL structure has a significant effect on its acidic strength, which finally determines the process efficiency for levulinate methyl generation. With the optimized catalyst of [C 3 H 6 SO 3 HPy]HSO 4 , 88.0% duckweed is consumed, resulting in a comparable methyl levulinate yield of 73.7% and a process efficiency of 81.8% at 170 °C for 5 h. Furthermore, this process is substantially influenced by the reaction condition, particularly, it is significantly temperature-dependent. In addition, solvent has a remarkable intensified effect on the process efficiency, which dramatically decreases from 81.8 to 53.7% when methanol is replaced by water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]