Production and Characterization of Biodiesel from Pumpkin Seed Oil
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Date
2019-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
World’s energy needs are largely met by use of non-renewable resources such as petrochemicals,
natural gas and coal. Increasing energy demands, environmental concerns and depletion of fossil
fuel reserves has led to the search for alternate fuels.
This work was done with the aim of producing biodiesel from pumpkin seed oil by using
methanol with alkali catalyst, sodium hydroxide. The effects of catalyst amount from 0.22g to
0.99g, molar ratio of methanol to oil from 6:1 to 12:1 and reaction temperature from 30 to
75 on biodiesel yield was investigated. Pumpkin seed oil was extracted using solvent
extraction (using hexane as a solvent).
The extracted oil was purified through degumming, neutralization, washing and drying
sequentially. Acid value, amount of free fatty acid, saponification value, kinematic viscosity,
higher heating value, iodine value and flash point of the extracted oil were determined. Biodiesel
was produced from pumpkin seed oil using anhydrous methanol 99% (w/w) and sodium
hydroxide catalyst 98.6% (w/w).
The experimental design was done by using the Design Expert 7.0.0 software three levels; three
factor Central Composite Design with full type in the optimization study, requiring 20
experiments. To determine the effect of temperature, amount of catalyst and molar ratio of
alcohol to oil experiments were done in the ranges of 30 to 60 , 0.22g to 0.99g and 6:1 to 12:1
subsequently. The maximum biodiesel yield was 88.7 % (w/w) at 45 , 9:1 molar ratio of
alcohol to oil and 0.99g amount of sodium hydroxide catalyst. In contrast, the minimum
biodiesel yield was 38% (w/w) at 60 , 12:1 molar ratio of alcohol to oil and 1.76g mass of
catalyst. The viscosity, density, flash point, acid value, saponification value, higher heating
value, iodine value Cetane number, moisture content and ash content of the produced biodiesel
were determined. These properties were matched with ASTM and EN standards specifications
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Keywords
biodiesel, pumpkin seed oil, Characterization