Alcoholysis kinetics and mechanism studies of ethyl levulinate production from ball milled corn stover.

Alcoholysis of ball-milled biomass over catalysts with Brønsted and Lewis acid sites provides an efficient and sustainable scheme to produce versatile biobased chemicals under mild conditions; however, optimizing the process parameters is challenged by the complexity of reaction pathways and the multiplicity of ball milling and combination catalyst gains. To address these challenges, we present kinetic analysis of ethyl levulinate (EL) production from ball-milled corn stover catalyzed by Brønsted (B) acidic ionic liquid [Bmim-SOH][HSO] (SOH-IL) and Lewis (L) acidic Al(SO). Product analysis shows that cellulosic substrates can form EL either through the intermediate ethyl-d-glycopyranoside (EDGP) or levoglucosenone (LGO), with the former leading the alcoholysis reaction.