Analysis of process variables on biodiesel transesterification reaction using Taguchi Method

Abstract

Continuous process for biodiesel production using homogeneous catalysts finds many constraints. Heterogeneous catalysts are the solution for the production of continuous biodiesel. One of the heterogeneous catalysts is zeolite/KIO3. Determination of operating conditions for heterogeneous catalysts, especiallyzeolite/KIO3 is required to obtain appropriate process conditions in order to the continuous system. The Taguchi method is one of experimental design that focuses on the variable approach to product quality improvement by control operation condition. Taguchi method is designed using 4 independent variables with 2 levels (4x2), which are temperature, mole ratio, time reaction and heterogeneous catalyst ratio. The Taguchi method can provide an analysis of the influence of each process variable significantly. This study aims to determine optimal operating conditions for the production of biodiesel with the KIO3 heterogeneous catalyst. Biodiesel is synthesized by esterification (pre-treatment) and transesterification following the Taguchi method. The source of triglyceride is crude palm oil while the alkyl source comes from methanol. Based on the result of analysis Taguchi method known that all process variables have an effect to transesterification reaction. But, variable temperature and reactant mole ratio give the most significant influence and show the interaction with p-value value 0.000 (temperature) and p-value 0.001(reactant mole ratio).Thus, for the production of biodiesel using the KIO3 heterogeneous catalyst obtained optimal operation conditions at temperature 65°C, mole ratio 1:6, time reaction 120 minutes and heterogeneous catalyst ratio at 5% (w/w). ANOVA gave result decided to reject Ho, and decided the reaction model influence by the variable process.