Effect of initial catalyst amount on production of bio-diesel from Jatropha Curcas seed using in-situ technique

The effectof initial catalyst amount(0.3 -1.5%) on the in-situproduction of biodiesel from raw Jatropha Curcas seed was studied at a reaction temperature of 600C and reaction time of between 120min. Central composite experimental design was applied to evaluate effect catalyst amount (0.3 –1.5%). Initial catalyst amount was found to have significant (P<0.05) positive influence effects on the yield up to a value of between 0.9 and 1.20 g/g after which there was a significant reduction in the yield of biodiesel produced. Due to formation of by-products (soaps) caused by excessive amount of catalyst there was a general reduction in Jatropha Curcas ethyl-ester as levels of catalyst amount increased. A cubic quadratic model was obtained to predict the yield as a function of catalyst amount. The model predicted well the observed data with a R2 value of 0.939 and a non-significant Lack-of-Fit (P<0.05). The optimal value for initial catalyst amount was obtained as 1.01g/g. The biodiesel obtained at optimal catalyst amount compared favorably with the ASTM D6751-02 standard for biodiesel