Continuous ultrasound‐assisted esterification and transesterification of palm fatty acid distillate for ethyl ester production

Abstract

Ethyl ester production from palm fatty acid distillate (PFAD) with ethanol in the presence of sulfuric acid and potassium hydroxide was performed in a continuous three‐step process using the ultrasound clamps and an ultrasonic probe. The ultimate goal was to produce biodiesel from the PFAD. In the first and second esterification steps, 16 units of a 400 W ultrasound clamp (20 kHz) were attached 100‐m apart along each tubular reactor. In the third transesterification step, a 1000‐W ultrasonic homogenizer (18 kHz) was used in a 100‐mL continuous reactor. A composite central design of experiments and the response surface methodology (RSM) were used to develop predic-tive models and identify the optimal conditions of each step based on the purities of ethyl ester. The optimal conditions in the first step were 46.1 vol.% ethanol, 1.4 vol.% sulfuric acid, and purity 66.68 wt.% ethyl ester. In the second step, the optimized conditions were 57 vol.% ethanol, and 2.1 vol.% sulfuric acid, purity 95.32 wt.% ethyl ester. The final transesterification step was carried out with 14.6 vol.% ethanol and 3.9 gKOH L−1 . As a result, a final ethyl ester purity of 98.15 wt.% was achieved in the biodiesel using the three‐step process.