Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Napoleon Ballroom C-D, 3rd fl (Sheraton New Orleans)
The objective of this study is to optimize the process parameters for the production of biodiesel from soybean oil using supercritical methanol and carbon dioxide as the co-solvent. The parameters selected for optimization were temperature, oil to methanol molar ratio and the amount of co-solvent. The experiments were designed based on central composite design (CCD). The temperature and oil to methanol molar ratio were tested between the ranges 250°C ∼280°C and 1:45 ∼1:55 respectively. The carbon dioxide to methanol molar ratio was varied from 0.4 to 2.0. The experiment was carried out in 300ml bench scale reactor. The biodiesel obtained by this process was analyzed for fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) content by using gas chromatograph. The optimum values of the process parameters were found and the design equation for the process was obtained. By using supercritical methanol along with carbon dioxide as the co- solvent biodiesel can be produced with less harsh reaction conditions. This will lead to energy saving and in turn reduces the production cost of the supercritical biodiesel. Since this supercritical process has less upstream and downstream process, this could be a viable alternative for catalytic process for the possible industrialization of the biodiesel production.