A Study of Biodiesel Produced from Palm Oil with the Assistance of CaO-La₂O₃

Abstract

By using palm oil as feedstock and methanol as an esterifying agent and CaO-La₂O₃ as the catalyst, effects of different catalyst’s activity and synthetic methods for biodiesel’s yield were researched. When the ratio of CaO and La₂O₃ and calcination’s temperature was 2.0:1.0 and 1,073 K, respectively, CaO-La₂O₃ had a good activity and stabilization. The co-settling method has the highest catalyst’s activity and biodiesel yield than that of other methods. The optimizing reaction temperature, reaction time, amount of catalyst, and ratio of methanol of palm oil were 70°C, 3.5 h, 2.5%, and 15:1, respectively. When CaO-La₂O₃ was reused five times, CaO-La₂O₃’s activity kept above 90%.

Keywords:

• biodiesel
• CaO-La₂O₃
• esterifies
• palm oil
• reaction condition