Sal biodiesel production using Indian abundant forest feedstock

Abstract

The objectives of present work are exploration and develop an indigenous fuel from abundant forest of India. India has 10 million hectors Sal (Shorea Robusta) forest which produced 180 million kg non-edible seeds annually. Since Sal seeds may be an option to fulfil the biodiesel mission of India due to its low acid value. So in the current research, single stage base catalyst transesterification was employed for biodiesel production. The work was focused on optimization of major characteristics such as cetane number, viscosity, calorific value and cold filter plugging point (CFPP) using response surface methodology (RSM). The significant process parameters of transesterification reaction such as methanol to oil molar ratio (3–15:1), KOH catalyst concentration (2.5–15 g/kg), reaction time (30–120 min) and reaction temperature (50–70 °C) were exploited to optimize the above properties and synchronize with production yield. After the optimization results, confirmation trails has been conducted and yield was achieved 98.94%. At the same time physicochemical properties were obtained such as cetane number 61.91, viscosity 4.97 cSt, calorific value 39.61 MJ/kg and CFPP 0.024 °C. Results were validated through the confirmation trails and all properties of Sal biodiesel are well within ASTM limits. So Sal seed is the needed source of biodiesel in India.