Industrial resin “INDION 130” modified with vanadyl cations as highly efficient heterogeneous catalyst for epoxidation of fatty compounds with TBHP as oxidant

Industrial grade cation-exchange resin “INDION 130” was modified with vanadyl cations by an ion-exchange method and then used for the epoxidation of unsaturated fatty materials including acids, esters and vegetable oils using tert -butyl hydroperoxide (TBHP) in decane as oxidant. The effect of oxidant/double bond ratio, catalyst concentration, recycling of the catalyst and temperature on the conversion to epoxides was studied. After the epoxidation, the catalyst could easily be recovered by filtration and successfully reused for at least seven runs without any loss in catalytic activity.