Impregnation process and kinetics studies of MgO nanocatalyst/montmorilonite-K10 for biodiesel production from Cerbera odollam oil in modified-microwave reactor

Abstract

Impregnation of MgO nanocatalysts on montmorillonite-K10 (MTe) and kinetics studies on transesterification reactions for biodiesel production using Cerbera odollam oil have been conducted. The impregnation process of nanocatalyst into MTe was carried out by mixing the MgO nanocatalyst with MTe dispersed in an ethanol solution. The MgO-MTe product was characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Transesterification reaction process of Cerbera odollam oil using MgO-MTe catalyst carried out in batch modified-microwave reactor with various oil/methanol ratios, reaction temperatures, reaction time, and the percentage weight of catalyst. Furthermore, the reaction kinetics analysis is done using the pseudo-first-order reaction. The quality of biodiesel was determined using the American society for testing and materials (ASTM) method for biodiesel test. The results show that with the increasing percentage weight of catalysts, product increases with optimum conditions obtained on the weight of catalysts 7% (w/w). Meanwhile, the ratio of oil-to-methanol ration with the optimum yield was obtained at 1:12 at 78 °C with reaction time of 3 h. The reaction kinetics analysis was obtained including k = 2.50 x 10⁻⁴ min⁻¹, E_a = 73.43 kJ mol⁻¹ and the pre-exponential factor A = 19.22 min.⁻¹