The Kinetics of the Esterification of Free Fatty Acids in Waste Cook- ing Oil Using Fe2（SO4）3/C Catalyst

• Published in: Chinese journal of chemical engineering Vol. 17; no. 1; pp. 83 - 87
• Main Author: 甘孟瑜 潘登 马利 岳恩 洪建兵
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: Fe2（S04）3／C; 动力学; 游离脂肪酸; 酯化反应; 餐饮废油脂
• ISSN: 1004-9541; 2210-321X

The esterification of free fatty acids （FFA） in waste cooking oil with methanol in the presence of Fe2（SO4）3/C （ferric sulfate/active carbon） catalyst was studied. The effects of different temperature, methanol/FFA mole ratio and amount of catalyst on the conversion of FFA were investigated. The results demonstrated that under optimal esterification conditions the final acid value of the resultant system can be reduced to -1 （mg KOH）.g^-1, which met fully the requirements in post-treatment for efficient separation of glycerin and biodiesel. The kinetics of the esterification were also investigated under different temperatures. The results indicated that the rate-control step could be attributed to the surface reaction and the esterification processes can be well-depicted by the as-calculated kinetic formula in the range of the experimental conditions.