Biodiesel

Pioneers of the Bio Fuel Industry in Sri Lanka

BFL BioKing Biodiesel in simple words is an advanced form of Biofuel. It refers to an animal or vegetable fat based renewable fuel, made up of a long chain of chemical compounds like propyl, ethyl, methyl etc. Created by chemically treating vegetable oil or animal fat with alcohol generating compounds, biodiesel is the revolution that is helping several countries overcome their dependence on diesel. It can be operated in any diesel engine with little or no modification to the engine or the fuel system.

In other words, biodiesel is domestically produced, clean burning fuel that can be produced from waste vegetable oils, animal fats, or recycled restaurant grease for use in diesel vehicles. It is biodegradable, less toxic and produce less pollutants when burnt completely. It can be used in pure form (B100) or blended with petroleum diesel. Most of the common blend include B2 (20% biodiesel, 80% petrodiesel), B5 (5% biodiesel, 95% petrodiesel) or B20 (20% biodiesel, 80% petrodiesel).

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The Process

Feedstock pretreatment

Common feedstock used in biodiesel production include yellow grease (recycled vegetable oil), "virgin" vegetable oil, and tallow. Recycled oil is processed to remove impurities from cooking, storage, and handling, such as dirt, charred food, and water. Virgin oils are refined, but not to a food-grade level. Degumming to remove phospholipids and other plant matter is common, though refinement processes vary. Regardless of the feedstock, water is removed as its presence during base-catalyzed transesterification causes the triglycerides to hydrolyze, giving salts of the fatty acids (soaps) instead of producing biodiesel.

Determination and treatment of free fatty acids

A sample of the cleaned feedstock oil is titrated with a standardized base solution in order to determine the concentration of free fatty acids (carboxylic acids) present in the vegetable oil sample. These acids are then either esterified into biodiesel, esterified into glycerides, or removed, typically through neutralization.

Reactions

Base-catalyzed transesterification reacts lipids (fats and oils) with alcohol (typically methanol or ethanol) to produce biodiesel and an impure coproduct, glycerol. If the feedstock oil is used or has a high acid content, acid-catalyzed esterification can be used to react fatty acids with alcohol to produce biodiesel. Other methods, such as fixed-bed reactors[4] , supercritical reactors, and ultrasonic reactors, forgo or decrease the use of chemical catalysts.

Product purification

Products of the reaction include not only biodiesel, but also byproducts, soap, glycerol, excess alcohol, and trace amounts of water. All of these byproducts must be removed to meet the standards, but the order of removal is process-dependent.

The density of glycerol is greater than that of biodiesel, and this property difference is exploited to separate the bulk of the glycerol coproduct. Residual methanol is typically recovered by distillation and reused. Soaps can be removed or converted into acids. Residual water is also removed from the fuel