Investigation of Microwave-Assisted Transesterification Reactor of Waste Cooking Oil
Abstract
In this work, the esterification and trans-esterification reactions of waste cooking oil (WCO) with high free fatty acids (FFA) ( ≥ 1% by weight) were investigated. This investigation used a two-step batch process with kinetic based reaction mechanisms and examined potential benefits of combining the conventional Fatty Acid Methyl Ester (FAME) trans-esterification method with microwave technology. Optimization of an acid-catalyzed FAME process to minimize FFA content in the feedstock found that a feed volume ratio of 0.3 L of methanol per liter of WCO, 2% grams of sulfuric acid (H2SO4) per gram of WCO for a reaction time of 200 min at a reaction temperature of 60 °C produced a biodiesel yield of 24%. By comparison, optimization of a base-catalyzed FAME process found that a feed volume ratio of 0.3 L methanol per liter WCO oil, 1 g of potassium hydroxide (KOH) per gram of WCO for a reaction time of 60 min at a reaction temperature of 60 °C produced a biodiesel yield of 93-98%. When microwave irradiation was included, the reaction time for the acid-catalyzed system was 80 min (compared to 200 min) and 10 min for the base-catalyzed system (compared to 60 min). These preliminary results suggest microwave technology merits further investigation for industrial application to biodiesel production.
Recommended Citation
A. A. Hassan and J. D. Smith, "Investigation of Microwave-Assisted Transesterification Reactor of Waste Cooking Oil," Renewable Energy, vol. 162, pp. 1735 - 1746, Elsevier, Dec 2020.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2020.09.123
Department(s)
Chemical and Biochemical Engineering
Research Center/Lab(s)
Center for High Performance Computing Research
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
0960-1481; 1879-0682
Document Type
Article - Journal
Document Version
Citation
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Rights
© 2020 World Renewable Energy Network (WREN), All rights reserved.
Publication Date
01 Dec 2020
Comments
The authors gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Wayne and Gayle Laufer Foundation that made this work possible.