Affiliations 

  • 1 Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Science, Curtin University Malaysia, CDT 250, 98009 Miri, Sarawak, Malaysia
  • 2 Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Science, Curtin University Malaysia, CDT 250, 98009 Miri, Sarawak, Malaysia. Electronic address: tanyiehua@curtin.edu.my
  • 3 Graphene & Advanced 2D Materials Research Group (GAMRG), School of Science and Technology, Sunway University, No. 5, Jalan Universiti, Bandar Sunway, 47500 Subang Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia
  • 4 Department of Chemical Process Engineering, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology (MJIIT) Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), Jalan Sultan Yahya Petra, 54100 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 5 Department of Chemical Engineering and Energy Sustainability, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, 94300 Kota Samarahan, Sarawak, Malaysia
Waste Manag, 2020 Dec;118:626-636.
PMID: 33011540 DOI: 10.1016/j.wasman.2020.09.016

Abstract

Due to its environment-friendly and replenishable characteristics, biodiesel has the potential to substitute fossil fuels as an alternative source of energy. Although biodiesel has many benefits to offer, manufacturing biodiesel on an industrial scale is uneconomical as a high cost of feedstock is required. A novel sulfonated and magnetic catalyst synthesised from a palm kernel shell (PMB-SO3H) was first introduced in this study for methyl ester or biodiesel production to reduce capital costs. The wasted palm kernel shell (PKS) biochar impregnated with ferrite Fe3O4 was synthesised with concentrated sulphuric acid through the sulfonation process. The SEM, EDX, FTIR, VSM and TGA characterization of the catalysts were presented. Then, the optimisation of biodiesel synthesis was catalysed by PMB-SO3H via the Response Surface Methodology (RSM). It was found that the maximum biodiesel yield of 90.2% was achieved under these optimum operating conditions: 65 °C, 102 min, methanol to oil ratio of 13:1 and the catalyst loading of 3.66 wt%. Overall, PMB-SO3H demonstrated acceptable catalysing capability on its first cycle, which subsequently showed a reduction of the reusability performance after 4 cycles. An important practical implication is that PMB-SO3H can be established as a promising heterogeneous catalyst by incorporating an iron layer which can substantially improve the catalyst separation performance in biodiesel production.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.