Transesterification of Rice Bran Oil for Biodiesel Production Using Metal-Zeolite Based Catalyst: A Process Simulation
Dhyna Analyes Trirahayu

Chemical Engineering Department, Politeknik Negeri Bandung, West Java, Indonesia

Abstract

The process simulation of biodiesel generation via heterogeneous catalytic transesterification process with rice bran oil (RBO) as feedstock was simulated using a kinetic model in ASPEN HYSYS. The effect of operating condition including methanol to oil ratio and reaction temperature to RBO conversion was studied using process simulation. The biodiesel production process consists of feedstock preheating, transesterification reaction, excess methanol recovery, and biodiesel purification. By varying the methanol to oil molar ratio range from 4 to 9 at constant temperature of 65C result in conversion range from 78.19-97.52% implying the conversion raise with the rising of methanol to oil ratio. The conversion ranged from 57.7-97.52% by varying temperature from 40-65C at constant methanol to oil molar ratio value 9. The properties of biodiesel favorably meet the biodiesel standard by ASTM D 6751 and EN 14214.

Keywords: biodiesel- rice bran oil- heterogenous catalyst, transesterification, process simulation

Topic: Renewable energy