Physical Characteristics of Palm Fatty Acid Distillate

Abstract

Palm fatty acid distillate (PFAD) is a widely used product due to its low cost being a by-product of (edible) palm oil manufacturing process. In this paper, the physical properties of palm fatty acid distilled (PFAD) produced in Malaysia will be discussed. The major physical properties obtained during this study are; the specific gravity at 28°C, moisture content, viscosity at 40°C, colour at 28°C, Pour point, Flash point and Oxidative stability values were 0.87±0.1g/ml, 0.63±0.1%, 96.35±0.1 cSt, 2R-20Y, 35±1ºC, 135±1ºC and 178±1ºC, respectively. A rather significant outcome is the great benefit of using PFAD for bio lubricant, which offers many positive characteristics, such us; it increases the viscosity, viscosity index, flash point and oxidative stability. Therefore PFAD has a good potential for biodiesel and bio lubricant industries.

D-optimal design optimization of unsaturated palm fatty acid distillate and trimethylolpropane esterification for biolubricant production

“…Surveys on the characteristics and properties of PFAD from Malaysia refineries have been conducted by Ping and Yusof (2009) [24] and the results show PFAD consist of more than 80% fatty acids comprises of myristic; C 14:0 (1.2%), palmitic; C 16:0 (46.9%), palmitoleic; C 16:1 (0.15%), stearic; C 18:0 (4.3%), oleic; C 18:1 (36.7%), linoleic; C 18:2 (9.1%), linolenic; C 18:3 (0.3%), arachidic; C 20:0 (0.2%) and others (0.1%). This study seems to be in line with the findings by Jumaah et al [25] and Baharudin et al [26], who noted that palmitic acid (47.1%) was the dominant fatty acid in the Malaysian PFAD, followed by oleic acid (36.6%) and linoleic acid (9.6%), respectively. Beside that PFAD consists of 14.4% glycerol, 0.5% vitamin E, 0.8% squalene, 0.4% sterols and 2.2% others [27,28].…”

“…Unsaturated palm fatty acid distillate (USFA-PFAD) represented by oleic acid (76%) was obtained from PFAD separation by low-temperature methanol crystallization [25]. Alcohol used was trimethylolpropane (TMP) purchased from Sigma Aldrich.…”

“…Under the optimum separation conditions, the percentage of USFA-PFAD in liquid fraction was determined to be 93% and 7% of SFA-PFAD with 48% yields. Oleic acid as the main unsaturated fatty acid constituent surged from 37.6% in PFAD to 76% in USFA-PFAD, while main constituent of saturated palmitic acid declined from 49% in PFAD to 6.2% in USFA-PFAD [25].…”

“…The fatty acids of USFA-PFAD mixture are dominated by oleic acid (76%) and linoleic acid (17%) [25]. It is plausible to predict that the same fatty acid acyls groups recompose in USFA-TMP ester as shown in Table 6.…”

Analysis of bentonite performance on the quality of refined crude palm oil's color, free fatty acid and carotene: the effect of bentonite concentration and contact time

“…The refining process of CPO involves three stages (degumming, bleaching and deodorization) ( Jumaah et al., 2019 ). The three stages are elaborated below: Degumming process …”