Production of Biodiesel from a Novel Combination of Raphia Africana Kernel Oil and Turtle Shell (Centrochelys Sulcata) Heterogenous Catalyst

Abstract

This work investigated the viability of a non-edible oil obtained from raphia africana in the production of biodiesel using a novel heterogeneous catalyst derived from turtle shells (Centrochelys sulcata). The study also proposed the use of acetone as co-solvent to enhance the solubility of the reacting mixtures. The turtle shells were calcined at 900oC for 3hr, impregnated in KOH to improve its activity and then supported with activated carbon produced from cassava peels to increase its surface area. The influences of KOH concentration, catalyst loading, catalyst/carbon mix ratio and concentration of acetone/methanol on the yield of biodiesel were investigated. The results obtained revealed that maximum biodiesel yield of 93% was obtained from the bio-oil at KOH concentration of 30% (w/w), catalyst loading of 6.5%, solvent/methanol ratio of 0.4 and catalyst/carbon weight ratio of 1.25. The activated carbon supported turtle shell catalyst has been found to possess very high catalytic activity converting bio-oil with high saturated fatty acid content to biodiesel with excellent fuel properties having low saturated fatty acids profile. Doi: 10.28991/HEF-2021-02-03-07 Full Text: PDF

Process design, simulation, and techno-economic analysis of integrated production of furfural and glucose derived from palm oil empty fruit bunches

“…This procedure also requires many separations, increasing the capital cost. To overcome this, lignocellulosic biomass can be processed into numerous products in a single plant in an integrated way (Jin et al 2018;Orugba et al 2021). For an integrated process plant producing both food and chemicals, glucose and furfural are selected as end products because they can be produced in a single facility with minimal equipment (Buaisha et al 2020;Loginova et al 2021).…”