Thesis Archive
Continuous Process of Glycerolysis of Waste Cooking Oil Through Microwave Irradiation
Baronia, Liezl Czarina P.
Fajardo, Mischelle Jazzfynne P.
Pablo, Catrina Paula Beatriz P.
Abstract:
As petroleum, coal, and natural gas, all non-renewable resources, being the primary sources of energy of the world while being a threat to nature, alternative energy sources are constantly being researched and investigated. One of the most popular fuel substitutes is biodiesel, which has many environmental benefits as it is known to be carbon-neutral, a renewable resource, and also biodegradable. Waste or used cooking oil is an example of feedstock for biodiesel production, however, waste cooking oil is known to have a high free fatty acid (FFA) content which is undesirable for the production of biodiesel. Glycerolysis is considered to be an attractive method in reducing the FFA content of various oils by converting triglycerides into monoglyceride and diglyceride, as it is less toxic, less costly, and has a fast reaction. In this study, the optimum parameters from Co et al. (2016) for a batch process of glycerolysis was tested using actual waste cooking oil from various sources namely from common household with 0.99% FFA, fried duck vendor with 3% FFA, fried chicken vendor with 2.2% FFA, and fried pork vendor with 10.8% FFA. The waste cooking oil from a common household was classified as low-FFA oil, the waste cooking oil from vendors selling fried duck and chicken were classified as moderate-FFA oil, and waste cooking oil from a vendor selling pork was classified as high-FFA oil. The reaction was conducted in a water bath having 60℃ for reaction temperature, 60 minutes for reaction time, 1.5:1 for glycerol to oil mass ratio, and 2 wt.% of NaOH for catalyst concentration, as the parameters. The FFA of all of the samples of waste cooking oil were reduced to less than 1 wt.%, having a value of 0.2% as the lowest achieved FFA value, that is the ideal requirement for transesterification for biodiesel production. Also, the FFA reduction for the oils ranged from 79% to 96%, waste cooking oil from a common household having the lowest FFA reduction while waste cooking oil from a fried pork vendor having the highest FFA reduction. It was also found that the difference in FFA content has no effect on the FFA reduction, which shows that glycerolysis is suitable for all waste cooking oil ranging from 0.99 to 10.8% FFA.
Adviser:
Madrazo, Cynthia F.
(Roces, Susan A.)