DEVELOPMENT OF LOCALLY SOURCED HETEROGENEOUS CATALYST FOR THE PRODUCTION OF BIODIESEL USING WASTE VEGETABLE OIL

ABSTRACT

The increasing awareness of the depletion of fossil fuel and environmental pollutions associated with its combustion, the hunt for alternative sources of renewable fuels has been intensified globally. In this study, heterogeneous catalyst was prepared from locally sourced plantain husk by calcination at 900^oC for 3 hours in a muffle furnace. Biodiesel fuel (BDF) was produced by transesterification of waste vegetable oil (WVO) using plantain husk ash (PHA) catalyst at oil-to-methanol ratio of 1:6 for 2 hours at 65^oC. in order to ascertain the effectiveness of PHA, different catalyst dosage (1 – 5%) was used to catalyze the WVO and compared with 1% potassium hydroxide (KOH) catalyst. The result obtained shows that 96.34% yield of BDF was established at 4% PHA as against 91.3% yield with 1% KOH. The range of viscosity and flash point obtained from the characterization of BDF was 3.91 to 5.3 mm²/s and 128 to 140^oC respectively. These values conform with standard (ASTM D6751) values of 1.9 to 6.0 mm²/s for viscosity, and a minimum flash point of 139^oC, giving an indication that locally sourced PHA-catalyzed biodiesel could provide the needed alternative to fossil diesel.