Kinetic Study on Synthesis of Biodiesel from Waste Cooking Oil Using Fly Ash/KNO3 Catalyst

Production of Biodiesel from waste cooking oil is considered one of the interesting processes in recent years. In this paper, Catalyst was prepared from solid waste materials, fly ash, and used for the production of biodiesel from waste cooking oil. Physico-chemical characterization of the prepared catalyst was done using FTIR, XRD and SEM. Performance evaluation of prepared catalyst was done for the maximum yield of biodiesel by varying temperature, reactants molar ratio (methanol to WCO) and loading of catalyst were studied and analyzed. The maximum conversion of 83.4% WCO was obtained at 60 °C in 90 min for molar ration of 1:9 (WCO to methanol) at loading of catalyst is 1.5 % by weight of reaction mixture. The reaction was carried out till the equilibrium obtained. The experimental data was analyzed to evaluate the kinetic parameters using the catalyst. For the Trans esterification reaction, the reaction follows pseudo first order kinetics at the higher mole rates of reactant methanol than the stoichiometry requirement. –ln(1-XA) vs time plots are drawn for the three reaction temperatures, i.e. 40,50 and 60oC, Arrhenius plots are drawn corresponding to all the reaction temperatures and the kinetic parameters are reported. Using the Fly Ash/KNO3catalyst, the activation energy is E = 11.62 kJ/mol and frequency factor is ko = 1.312 1/min