This work reports on liquid-liquid equilibria in the system 1-butanol, oleic acid, water and n-heptane used for biphasic, lipase catalysed esterifications. The literature was studied on the mutual solubility in binary systems of water and each of the organic components. Experimental results were obtained on the composition of the coexisting phases of a series of ternary and quaternary mixtures of the components at 301,308 and 313 K. The data were correlated successfully with the UNIQUAC model that was extended with ternary interaction parameters. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.