Biofuel Production from Cooking Oil and its Physicochemical Properties

The production of biofuels such as biodiesel has attracted considerable attention as a cleaner source of renewable energy, which can greatly contribute to reducing our dependence on fossil fuels. A million liters of edible oil used for cooking foods and date expired oils from oil manufacturers are discarded into sewage. This study primarily intends to study the feasibility of biodiesel production using such waste oils. In this work, biodiesel was prepared from waste cooking oils by a process called transesterification with KOH as a catalyst. Our results showed that methyl ester (biodiesel) (92.67±0.90%). In this study, we were interested in the production of a biofuel based on non-food used frying oil, and followed by a physico-chemical evaluation, the results obtained showed the thermo-oxidative alteration of this oil, confirmed by the evolution of the physico-chemical indices during frying. At the end, this used oil is recovered as fuel (biodiesel). The production of biodiesel is obtained by the transesterification reaction, with a conversion rate of 85%. The physico-chemical properties determined are very interesting and close to those of commercial diesel.