Biodiesel Production Using Supercritical Methanol in Bench-Scale Reactor

Abstract

Biodiesel is preferred as an alternative fuel due to its sustainability and easy availability of raw materials. Studies to improve biodiesel production time and costs are gaining importance in terms of being used in higher portions as a fuel. Traditional catalytic biodiesel production is time- energy-consuming due to feedstock preprocessing, product separation, and purification steps. Non-catalytic biodiesel production using supercritical alcohol may shorten and eliminate the pre- and post-production stages in terms of time and cost compared to traditional methods. In this study, canola oil was converted to biodiesel using supercritical methanol. Biodiesel production was carried out in the bench-size supercritical reactor that was fabricated as part of this study. The higher yield was obtained from biodiesel produced using canola oil and supercritical methanol compared to the traditional catalytic methods. 98.8 % yield was obtained at 240˚C and 8.3 MPa which were just above the critical temperature and pressure of methanol. Including reaction and separation, the complete process via supercritical transesterification took 180 minutes, while the whole traditional base-catalyzed transesterification process takes approximately one day.

Keywords

• Biodiesel
• Supercritical methanol
• Transesterification

References

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