PURIFICATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF BIODIESEL FEEDSTOCK USING ORGANIC ADSORBENTS

Abstract

In the recent times there has been greater awareness on biodiesel due to shortage of petro-diesel newlineand soaring prices. The most conventional method in use, for the conversion of vegetable oils, newlineanimal oils and non-edible oils to combustible liquid fuels i.e. biodiesel, typically involves newlinetransesterifand#970;cation. There are a number of water soluble impurities left in biodiesel after the newlinecompletion of process. The performance of biodiesel depends heavily on the purity of final newlineproduct and complete absence of particulates or contaminants. In order to have better newlineperformance, impurities are required to be removed. Traditionally, wet purification technique is newlinebeing used for the purification but due to environmental concerns regarding the disposal of newlineeffluents, there is a need for using adsorbents which can make the process environment friendly. newlineThis work compares the efficiency of different organic adsorbents among each other as well as newlinewith traditional wet purification technique for the removal of impurities from Jatropha curcas newlinebased transesterified biodiesel. Some natural adsorbents and biosorbents, effective in the removal newlineof heavy metals from waste water have also been used under the similar conditions optimized newlinewith organic adsrobents. The response of each adsorbent was measured through the newlinedetermination of all the potential impurities like, free alkali, residual alcohol, moisture content, newlinesoap content and free and bonded glycerol; present in the biodiesel in accordance with ASTM/EN newlinestandard test method. The adsorbents were also characterized through Scanning Electron newlineMicroscopy (SEM) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS) for studying the changes in newlinemorphology before and after their use. Comparison of Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy newline(FTIR) spectra for purified and unpurified biodiesel samples further supported the efficiency and newlineeffectiveness of natural adsorbents. Efficiency of the purified biodiesel was further tested on the newlinecompression ignition (C.I.) engine by comparing its performance with diesel.