Effects of Beneficiation of Kaolin Clay Catalysts on Biodiesel Yield Using Used Cooking Oil (UCO)

The effects of both acid and base beneficiations on Kaolin clay catalysts (KCC) were investigated. Unmodified Kaolin clay can be used directly as catalysts or catalyst support for production of fatty acid methyl esters (FAME). Modification via calcination, acid or base beneficiation, addition of metal supports are often used to improve FAME yield. In this paper, 6M sulphuric acid was used to prepare the acid-beneficiated Kaolin clay catalyst. Also, 22.5% potassium hydroxide (KOH) was employed to prepare base-beneficiated Kaolin clay catalyst. Both beneficiated catalysts were characterized by FT-IR, SEM/EDX, XRD, TGA/DTA and BET. The acid-activated /beneficiated catalyst calcined at 600­oC for 4h with reaction temperature of 120oC, catalyst loading of 3.5wt%, methanol to oil molar ratio of 9:1 and reaction time of 5h give the best yield of 67%, while base treated raw Kaolin clay catalyst with reaction temperature of 70oC, catalyst loading of 15wt%; methanol/oil molar ratio of 14:1 and reaction time of 3h give the best yield of 78%.