Technical Session - 6

Title:          Studies of Biodiesel Production from Rubber Seed Oil and Testing of Performance Characteristics in a Diesel Engine
Authors:      Nguyen Thi Thanh Xuan, Duong Viet Dung
Abstract:     The results of various researchers support the use of biodiesel as a viable alternative to conventiona petroleum fuel for use in diesel engines. However biodiesel production from refined edible type oils such as sunflower, soybean and palm oil causes the risk of competition with food and land. This increases the overall production cost of the biodiesel as well which is not economical. Hence, it is better to use the non-edible type of oil for biodiesel production. The aim of this paper is to study the suitability of locally available rubber seed oil in Vietnam as substitutes to conventional diesel fuel in diesel engines. The significant properties of rubber seed oil include oil content, water content, acid value, saponification numbers, density, viscosity are found out during this investigation. The acid value for rubber seed oil is high (around of 50 mg KOH/g oil). A two-step transesterification method is developed to produce biodiesel from rubber seed oil possessing very high free fatty acid (FFAs). The first step, acid catalysed esterification reduces the FFA content of the oil to less than 2%. The second step, alkaline catalysed transesterification process converts the products of the first step to its monoesters and glycerol. The major factors affect the conversion efficiency of the process such as molar ratio, amount of catalyst, reaction temperature and reaction duration is analysed. The blends of pure rubber seed oil as well as biodiesel from rubber seed oil via transesterification with conventional diesel were used as fuels in the CI engine and the performance and emission characteristics of the engine were analysed. The experimental results proved that the use of biodiesel produced from unrefined rubber seed oil is a viable alternative to the diesel fuel.

Keywords:   Rubber Seed oil, Biodiesel, Tranesterification method, Engine performance, Exhaust Emissions
Pages:         335-340

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