Synthesis and Characterization of Biodiesel from Simarouba glauca

Abstract

Biofuel is produced from biological resources such as plants and animal origin, rather than a fuel produced by geological processes. It is involved in the formation of fossil fuels, such as coal and petroleum which is from prehistoric biological matter. Many researchers are working in the area of synthesis and characterization of biodiesels using non edible oils in the globe. In the present work an attempt is made to prepare the biodiesel from Simarouba glauca non-edible oil and its properties have been presented in this paper. Simarouba seeds contain 23% of oil with seed to kernel ratio of about 3:1. The oil containing FFA 7.85% was converted into biodiesel by two stage process. The first step, acid catalyzed esterification process to reduce FFA below 3%. In the second stage, transesterification process was carried out using NaOH and Methanol. During this experiment the maximum yield of biodiesel was obtained 6:1 molar ratio of methanol to the oil. The acid value of the biodiesel was found to be 0.28. The oxidation stability of the Simarouba biodiesel (SBD) was evaluated using Rancimat method EN 14112 was to be 3.5 h, cloud point of SBD was found to be 19 {\textdegree}C which may be due to the higher saturated fatty acids in the bio diesel. SBD obtained was found to be comparable with the ASTM and BIS specifications.