Fuel Properties of Nigerian Castor seed Oil Biodiesel

Abstract

This paper presents an explicit account of the fuel properties of biodiesel produced from Nigeria castor seed oil. The oil was first characterized for its physico-chemical properties. This was subsequently followed by transesterification of the castor seed oil with methanol in a laboratory reactor using 1% w/v potassium hydroxide (KOH) catalyst at a temperature of 45 °C, mole ratio of methanol to oil of 6:1 and reaction time of 60 minutes. Standard fuel characterization (ASTM fuel tests) was carried out on the resulting biodiesel. Experimental results shown that optimum of 96% methyl ester yield were obtained at 45 °C with a corresponding purity of 98.06% against the European Union lower limit of 96.5%. The important properties of the biodiesel such as specific gravity, flash point, total sulphur, pour point, kinematic viscosity, cetane number, cloud point and water and sediment values were 0.88, 150 °C, 0.006%, 1 °C, 2.5 mm²/s, 48.32 ± 2, 6 °C and 0.04% vol respectively. These values compared favorably with the ASTM and EN standards for biodiesel. The result validates that Nigeria castor seed oil methyl ester could be used as an alternative to petroleum diesel.