Biodiesel production using magnetically stabilized fluidized bed reactor

Abstract

A novel production process of biodiesel using magnetically stabilized fluidized bed reactor (MSFBR) has been developed based on cottonseed oil and the reaction conditions were also studied. The reactant flow rate and magnetic field intensity affects on the magnetic catalytic particles behavior in the column were performed, and the transesterification reaction conditions of cottonseed oil were investigated in MSFBR with nanometer magnetic catalytic particles. Under the suitable reaction conditions of methanol/oil molar ratio 8:1, 40 cm 3 min −1 flow rate, 225 Oe magnetic field intensity and temperature of 65 °C, the conversion efficiency reaches to 97% in 100 min. The stability and recovery of the magnetic catalytic particles in MSFBR are much better than that in autoclave stirred reactor. The result shows that most of the resultant cottonseed oil biodiesel parameters comply with the limits established by representative biodiesel standards.