Influences of different co-solvents in simultaneous supercritical extraction and transesterification of Jatropha curcas L. seeds for the production of biodiesel

Abstract Simultaneous supercritical extraction and transesterification (SET) process is a novel biodiesel production process for oil seeds in which the solid oil-bearing material is used as the primary reactant together with short-chain alcohol directly in supercritical condition. In this experimental work, SET process with methanol was carried out in a high-pressure batch reactor to produce fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) from Jatropha curcas L. seeds (15.0 g feed, 300 °C, 5.0 ml/g methanol to solid ratio and 30 min). Different types of co-solvents (pentane, heptane, toluene, tetrahydrofuran, nitrogen and carbon dioxide) with varying amount (1.0–5.0 ml/g for liquid and 10–50 bar for gas) were added into the process to study their influences towards the extraction efficiency, E y and FAME yield, F y . It was found that pentane and CO 2 provided higher responses ( E y : 102.6% and 107.0%, F y : 100.4% and 102.3%) at concentration of 1.0 ml/g and 50 bar respectively. Addition of pentane and CO 2 was also discovered to lower the critical conditions of the reactant mixture and could achieve near optimum product yield at lower temperature (280 °C) and lower methanol to solid ratio (4.0 ml/g). Addition of appropriate co-solvents could increase the extraction rate (solid–liquid) and enhance methanol–oil inter-phase miscibility during the reaction phase. This proved that SET process can be rather promising as another alternative route for biodiesel production.

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