Ritwan Masae. Magnetic nanoparticles for removal of free fatty acid from vegetable and biodiesel oils. Master's Degree(Engineering Technology). Thammasat University. Thammasat University Library. : Thammasat University, 2015.
Magnetic nanoparticles for removal of free fatty acid from vegetable and biodiesel oils
Abstract:
In conventional alkaline-based biodiesel production, free fatty acid (FFA) in oil feedstock can cause undesirable soap and high FFA content in biodiesel product also cause rancidity and corrosion. To develop a new technique for FFA removal in both biodiesel feedstock and biodiesel, iron oxide magnetic nanoparticles (MNP) synthesized by co-precipitation were introduced as an adsorbent, which can be easily separated from oil medium using simple external magnet. The synthesized MNP possesses superparamagnetic behavior with 83 emu/g of saturation magnetization. Transmission electron microscope images revealed the average particle size of about 10 14 nm in agreement with the result from X-ray diffraction. In oil, there are some cluster aggregations with the mean size of 442 ± 99 nm. The adsorption experiment could be well described by Langmuir isotherm with the maximum FFA adsorption capacity of 64 and 92 mgFFA/gMNP in the vegetable oil and biodiesel, respectively. The kinetics of adsorption of FFA onto MNP in biodiesel is about 6 times faster than that in vegetable oil due to the lower viscosity of biodiesel (6.78 mm2/s) which is much smaller than that of vegetable oil (45.33 mm2/s). The spent MNP could be regenerated with sodium hydroxide and reused for subsequent adsorption for at least 3 cycles with adsorption capacity of about 70%. Inductively coupled plasma revealed that the differences of iron content before and after adsorption are 2 and 5 ppm for vegetable and biodiesel oils, respectively. Percent weight loss of oleic acid on MNP is equivalent to 65 and 66 mgFFA/gMNP. Thermogravimetric analysis showed the significant decomposition in the range of 200 - 450 ◦C, which can be assigned to the removal of FFA adsorbed on MNP surface. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy shows that these FFA in oil media also adsorbed onto the iron oxide surface in the bridging and chelating bidentate configuration, which is similar to other works
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