Improved Quality Soy-Oil Based Biodiesel Fuel- Phase II

The benefits of biodiesel are well documented. Problems related to fuel quality, filter plugging, injector failure, material compatibility, and fuel economy persist and must be resolved before wide spread use of biodiesel can be addressed. Most of these problems are due to the presence of double bonds in the fatty acid residues, which impacts its oxidation and storage stability. These inherent problems hinder the use of biodiesel in cold temperatures, negatively affect fuel economy, increase particulate emission, and lead to power loss. We have demonstrated a potentially simple and efficient chemical modification whereby the soy-based oil is cleaved at the double bonds, thus eliminating all unsaturation and reducing the overall molecular weight of the fuel. This one-step process is fast, selective and simple which, is expected to provide an economical route to improve the quality of vegetable-based biodiesel fuels. Our process should increase the cetane number, decrease NOx emission and alleviate filter plugging and gumming. Our modification can also extend the low temperature flow characteristics of current biodiesel and thus eliminate cold flow issues. The replacement of 1% of current on-road diesel fuel with biodiesel would require 300 million gallon biodiesel or 215 million bushels of soybeans. The gross impact on the farm economy would be of the order of $800million.