Feasibility Study to Produce Biodiesel from Low Cost Oils and New Catalysts Derived from Agricultural & Forestry Residues

This research will develop and demonstrate the feasibility of preparing reusable and recoverable solid, porous acid and base catalysts for biodiesel production using activated carbon generated from agricultural and forestry residues (i.e., a sustainable biomass). These new catalysts will greatly reduce amounts of waste pollutants that are generated compared to current methodology that uses sodium and potassium hydroxide and generates more pollutants than biodiesel product. The new catalysts will also enable biodiesel to be made from low cost oils such as animal fats the contain 5% or more of free fatty acids. Free fatty acids that are prevalent in low quality fats and oils (e.g., yellow grease and/or rendered fat) will be converted to their methyl esters using an acidic, immobilized solid-phase reusable catalyst made from pyrolytic char that is derived from waste agricultural and forestry biomass (e.g., peanut hulls, pecan shells, and pine chips). In addition, current transesterification technology using homogeneous base catalysts such as sodium hydroxide in stoichiometric amounts will be replace with an alkaline, immobilized solid-phase reusable catalyst made from waste agricultural and forestry biomass. Representative low-quality fats and oils will also be converted to biodiesel using the new catalysts. The catalysts will be recovered and reused to determine if catalytic decay occurs. The quality of the biodiesel produced from the reactions using the new biomass catalysts will be measured using key analytical method specified in ASTM D6751 standard specification for biodiesel fuel. Our results will determine if a biodiesel process based on the synthesized catalysts is feasible and provide a basis for scale-up.