The continuous synthesis of environmentally friendly lubricants based on oleic acid methyl ester is studied as part of the collaborative research center 442 (SFB 442). Overall aim is to develop environmentally friendly high performance tribosystems. Therefore, engineers, material scientists, chemists, and biologists are working closely together. Our research is focused on the development of new environmentally friendly lubricants. We use oleic acid methyl ester from renewable sources as starting material. This is processed to give a lubricant within the two steps epoxidation and successive alcoholysis.

The reaction is currently carried out routinely as a batch process on a 50L scale to satisfy the needs of the collaborators for the use in machining and property testing. For the development of an environmentally friendly product, evaluation of toxicity and biodegradability has to be taken into account which could be demonstrated successfully for the batch process. Thus, besides yield and selectivity these factors are taken into account directly as the process is developed and are used to judge alterations and process intensification directly

We will present results concerning the transfer to a continuous process and the impact on product properties and performance. Part of the strategy for process intensification is the use of microreaction engineering.