Abstract:
Growing concern regarding energy resources and the environment has increased interest in the study
of alternative sources of energy. To meet increasing energy requirements, there has been growing
interest in alternative fuels like biodiesel to provide a suitable diesel oil substitute for internal
combustion engines. Biodiesels offer a very promising alternative to diesel oil since they are
renewable and have similar properties. It is a promising substitute as an alternative fuel and has
gained significant attention due to the predicted shortness of conventional fuels and environmental
concern. The utilization of liquid fuels such as biodiesel produced from waste cooking oil by trans
esterification process represents one of the most promising options for the use of conventional fossil
fuels. However, as the biodiesel is produced from vegetable oils and animal fats, there are concerns
that biodiesel feedstock may compete with food supply in the long-term. Hence, the recent focus rely
on using waste cooking oil as the substantial feed stocks for biodiesel production.
In this study, cooking oils such as refined palm oil, vacuum fried palm oil and used sunflower oil has
been subjected to trans esterification reaction by catalytic method obtaining the biodiesel. In the
catalytic trans esterification free fatty acids and water always produce negative effects since the
presence of free fatty acids and water causes soap formation, consumes catalyst, and reduces catalyst
effectiveness. Pre-treatment of oils were employed to reduce the moisture content of the oils. Acid
esterification prior to alkali esterification was employed to neutralize the FFA content which reduced
the FFA content for alkali esterification increasing the yield upto 97%.
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