A Feasibility Study on Biodiesel Production from Waste Beef Subcutaneous Fats

This paper deals with the feasibility study of biodiesel production from the tallow rendered from the subcutaneous wastes. The subcutaneous wastes were collected from leather tanneries and animal slaughter houses. The fat content was determined based on the proximate analysis of the collected wastes and various rendering techniques were employed to study the rendering effectiveness. Base catalysed single step transesterification was carried out for biodiesel production. The characterization and quantification of biodiesel was done with the help of FT-IR and GC spectra. Maximum fat content in subcutaneous wastes was found to be 92.84%. The dry rendering technique was found to be very effective than compared to the wet rendering technique and was 18.04% greater than wet rendering technique. The most optimized transesterification parameters were found to be (i) molar ratio: 9.5, (ii) catalyst concentration: 3%, (iii) reaction temperature: 65OC and (iv) reaction time: 70 minutes. The confirmation of biodiesel was concluded from the high intensity peaks in the FT-IR spectra at 1752cm-1 and 1185cm-1 which corresponds to the C=O stretching and O-CH3 group. Ethyl Oleate, Ethyl Palmitate, Ethyl Stearate and Ethyl Myristate were identified as the dominant fatty acids with availability of 40.25%, 21.26%, 17.41% and 3.59% respectively. Based on the results, it can be concluded that possibility of producing biodiesel from subcutaneous wastes was high and can be a viable replacement as low cost feedstock from waste.