Kim SM  Kim DK  Lee JS  Park SC  Rhee YW

Vol. 18,  No. 1, pp. 102-110, Mar.  2012

Animal fat Oil extraction Esterification Transesterification reactions

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In this study, the production of bio-diesel from animal oil by esterification and trans-esterification. was investigated. There were three different extraction methods for oil extraction from raw animal fat. Heterogeneous catalysts such as Amberlyst-15 and Amberlyst BD-20 and a homogeneous catalyst such as sulfuric acid were used for esterification. Among three catalysts, the removal efficiency of Free Fatty Acid (FFA) was the highest in sulfuric acid. Response surface method was carried out to find the optimal esterification condition of sulfuric acid and methanol. After the esterification under the optimal condition, this animal fat was used for the trans-esterification. Animal oil used for trans-esterification was below 1% of FFA content and 0.09% of water content. The catalysts for trans-esterification were KOH, NaOH and NaOCH3. To investigate the effects of catalyst type and amount on transesterification. The amount of catalyst was changed with 0.3, 0.6 and 0.9 wt%. The molar ratio of methanol/oil was changed with 4, 6, 9 and 12. The amount of catalyst was fixed to 0.8 wt%. The KOH catalyst showed the highest FAME conversion for trans- esterification, and the optimal methanol/oil weight ratio was 6. In the experiments of various catalysts and methanol molar ratios, the highest content of FAME is 96%. However, this FAME content was below Korean bio-diesel standard which is 96.5% of FAME content. After distillation, FAME content increased to 98%.