Biodiesel production from spirulina algae oil over cobalt microsphere through esterification reaction

Abstract

This study displays the production and conformance of cobalt microsphere as a catalyst in the esterification reaction for biodiesel production from spirulina algae oil. The porous microsphere was successfully synthesized via a simple solvothermal method and evaluated using EDX, XRD, FE-SEM, TGA, CO2-TPD, and BET. The resulting microsphere cobalt has a surface area of 150.83 m2/g and a total pore volume of 35.33 cm3/g. The optimal reaction conditions for the esterification of spirulina algae oil over the cobalt microsphere were: 60 °C, a molar ratio of 7:1 for methanol: spirulina algae oil, and 240 min to achieve 95 % yield of corresponding product. Also, biodiesel samples comply with the ASTM standards. The chemical composition of spirulina oil was analyzed by GC-Mass analysis. The cobalt microsphere offers various benefits such as stability (chemical/physical), simple catalyst separation, and the production of high-quality biodiesel.