The impact of CuCO<sub>3</sub> nano particles on the rheology of biodiesel extracted from castor oil

Transesterification tend to be the most adopted method of producing biodiesel, but the outcome is associated with high viscosity especially at low temperature. Viscosity is the most important rheological property of biodiesel. This paper investigates the impact of Cupper II Carbonate (CuCO3) nanoparticles on the rheology of biodiesel extracted from castor oil. The CuCO3 nanoparticles has been subjected to Xray fluoroscopy (XRF) in order to determine its elemental composition. The crude castor oil was purified, trans-esterified and CuCO3 nanoparticles were dispersed in the trans-esterified oil with concentration ranging from 0.1wt% to 1.0wt% in 0.1wt% interval. Fourier Transform Infrared spectra (FTIR) was used to examine the functional groups of the transesterified sample. The samples were subjected to viscosity measurement using digital viscometer at a temperature range of 20oC to 100oC at the interval of 20oC. The XRF characterization shows that the CuCO3 nanoparticles used is pure due to the fact that its percentage concentration tends to be 92.11%. FTIR analysis indicate that the ester (biodiesel) was achieved at 1744.4 peak. The viscosities of the samples decrease as the temperature increases and with the increase in the amount CuCO3 concentration. The viscosity tends to be best at the application of 0.3wt%. This shows that CuCO3 nanoparticles can be used as biodiesel additive using castor oil as feedstock.