Evaluation of a high oleic soybean oil variety in lubricant and biodiesel applications

Abstract

Soybean oil is an abundant commodity crop that has garnered attention for its use as a feedstock for sustainable materials. Soybean oil is high in polyunsaturated fatty acid content, which can promote undesirable properties in biodiesel and lubricant applications. In this work, we characterized the fatty acid composition of commercial soybean oil along with two other soybean oil varieties, Ellis and TN18‐4110. Ellis and commercial soybean oils had similar fatty acid compositions, while TN18‐4110 was enriched in the monounsaturated oleic acid. Biodiesel and estolides were prepared from the three varieties and the relevant physical properties were measured. In comparison to commercial soybean diesel, both Ellis and TN18‐4110 exhibited unique advantages. As estolide‐based lubricants, all three varieties had advantageous cold flow properties, but TN18‐4110 also possessed excellent oxidative stability and lower viscosity. The physical properties and structural property relationships of the biodiesel and estolides are discussed.

Cold-Flow Properties of Estolides: The Older (D97 and D2500) versus the Mini-(D5773 and D5949) Methods

“…The saturated fatty acids are the main contributor to the poor low-temperature properties, while unsaturated fatty acids with one or more double bonds are prone to oxidation [13]. The oleic acid with one double bond is the best "compromise" fatty acid, which leads to the interest in high-oleic oils [14][15][16][17]. Nevertheless, even these oils lack sufficient performance for most of the applications.…”

“…Still, transesterifications have limited effect on the cold-flow properties and oxidative stability of vegetable oil. Due to this, reacting of the double bonds is often included as part of bio-based lubricant synthesis [5][6][7][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34]. The bio-based lubricants and related materials are used to some extent in almost every application [5][6][7]24,35,36].…”