Biodiesel Production using Jatropha Oil

Abstract

The world is confronted with the twin crises of fossil fuel depletion and environmental degradation. Efforts are under way in many countries, including India, to search for suitable alternative diesel fuels that are environment friendly. The need to search for these fuels arises mainly from the standpoint of preserving the global environment and the concern about long-term supplies of conventional hydrocarbonbased fuels. Biofuel is referred to as liquid or gaseous fuels for the transportation sector that are predominantly produced from biomass. Among the different possible sources, biodiesel, an alternative diesel fuel is derived from vegetable oil, animal fats, or waste vegetable oils, is obtained by reacting the oil or fat with an alcohol (transesterification) in the presence of a catalyst to give the corresponding mono alkyl esters. Biodiesel is a renewable replacement to petroleum based diesel. Biodiesel fuels offer a potentially very interesting alternative to mineral diesel regarding harmful emissions in addition to engine wear, cost and availability. Its biodegradability and given that all the organic carbon present is photosynthetic in origin, it does not contribute to a rise in the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and consequently to the greenhouse effect. The present work reports transesterification via catalytic route which is the better option among all the routes using the jatropha oil as a raw material. The catalyst used is KOH. The main focus is on the production of the biodiesel at the laboratory scale. Quality checking of the prepared sample is covered. Overall kinetic study and performance of B20 and B40 on the diesel engine was also performed. The results of the project show that the yield of the biodiesel using jatropha oil is upto 80 to 85 %. The emission of the air pollutant like SO2 and SPM is decreases with the different biodiesel blends with different proportion without major changes in the engine performance.