Comparison of biodiesel productivities of different vegetable oils by acidic catalysis

Abstract

Biodiesel has become a subject which increasingly attracts worldwide attention because of its environmental benefits, biodegradability and renewability. Biodiesel production typically involves the transesterification of a triglyceride feedstock with methanol or other short-chain alcohols. This paper presents a study of transesterification of various vegetable oils, sunflower, safflower, canola, soybean, olive, corn, hazelnut and waste sunflower oils, with the acidic catalyst. Under laboratory conditions, fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) were prepared by using methanol in the presence of 1.85% hydrochloric acid at 100 °C for 1 h and 25 °C for 3 h. The analyses of biodiesel were carried out by gas chromatography and thin layer chromatography. Also, biodiesel productivities (%) were determined on basis of the ratio of ester to oil content (w/w). The biodiesel productivities for all oils were found to be about 80% and about 90% at 25 and 100 °C, respectively. Also, the results showed that the yield of biodiesel depended on temperature for some oils, including canola, sunflower, safflower oils, but it was not found significant differences among all of the oil types on biodiesel productivities.