THE STUDY OF REUSED SILICA-TITANIA CATALYST ON BIODIESEL PRODUCTION IN VARIOUS REACTION TIMES

Abstract

This study has related to biodiesel production from Waste Cooking Oil (WCO) with reused silica-titania catalyst in various reaction times (2 – 6h). The reused silica-titania catalyst in this study has been obtained by washing the silica-titania waste released from the separation of catalyst and biodiesel product from palm and waste cooking oils in various reaction times. The washing silica-titania named by reused silica-titania has been characterized by DR UV-Vis to confirm the existence of titanium tetrahedral coordination. Meanwhile, the biodiesel product was characterized by FTIR and several properties such as density, flow rate and an acid number have been analyzed in order to study the reusability of silica-titania in biodiesel production. In addition, the results show that the fraction of titanium tetrahedral coordination in reused silica-titania catalyst (1st and 2nd time) was found to be 26.11% and 24.02%, respectively.  The optimum reaction time was found to be 3h, which has been used for FTIR characterization to see significant absorption bands in the wavenumber range of 1300 – 1000 cm-1. This range was attributed to absorption bands of C – O ester from triglycerides and C – O from carboxyl group. The main absorption FTIR bands of biodiesel products and WCO are relatively similar. The examinations of biodiesel properties with respect to density, flow rate, and acid number were conducted at optimum reaction time (3h).