Biodiesel Production from Residual Palm Oil Contained in Spent Bleaching Earth by In Situ Trans-Esterification

• Main Authors: A S Fahmil QRM, E. Gumbira-Sa id, Ani Suryani
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Thai Society of Higher Eduction Institutes on Environment 2014-06-01
• Series: EnvironmentAsia
• Subjects: spent bleaching earth; palm oil; In situ trans-esterification; biodiesel; optimization process
• Online Access: http://www.tshe.org/ea/pdf/vol7no2-04.pdf

Spent Bleaching Earth (SBE) is an industrial solid waste of vegetable oil industry that has a high residual oil to be potentialy converted to biodiesel. This study aims at developing a biodiesel production process technology by utilizing residual palm oil contained in SBE and to test the use of hexane in the trans-esterification process. Optimization process was done by using the Response Surface Method (RSM). The variables studied included catalyst concentration and reaction time. On the other hand, the deoiled SBE resulted from biodiesel production was tested as an adsorbent on biodiesel purification after being reactivated. The method used in the biodiesel production included an in situ acid catalysed esterification followed by in situ base catalysed trans-esterification. The results of RSM showed that the optimum process was obtained at NaOH concentration of 1.8% and reaction time of 104.73 minutes, with a predicted response rate of 97.18% and 95.63% for validation results. The use of hexane could also increase the yield of biodiesel which was obtained on the ratio of hexane to methanol of 0.4:1 (volume of hexane: volume of methanol). On the other hand, the reactivated bleaching earth was effective as an adsorbent in biodiesel production, which was still conform with the Indonesian National Standard.