Transesterification of parsley seed oil using a green catalyst: considering the optimization process and modeling

Abstract

The production of bio-based diesel by using calcium oxide catalyst derived from waste material was investigated in this work as well as the influence of varying the process variables on the biodiesel yield. The optimisation of the process variables (ratio of alcohol-to-oil, temperature, and the amount of catalyst) for parsley biodiesel was achieved using RSM. The biodiesel yield of 92.19% was predicted from the data analysis as the optimum yield at optimum reaction conditions of 9.4:1, 59.31°C, and 2.7 wt% for the molar ratio of alcohol: oil, temperature and catalyst amount respectively. The characterisation of the biodiesel was achieved with FTIR and GC-MS. Also, the fuel characteristics of biodiesel were within the specifications of the ASTM D6751.

Keywords

• parsley seed oil
• biodiesel
• calcined eggshells
• box-behnken design
• fuel properties