UTILIZATION OF WASTE ANIMAL BONE AS A HETEROGENEOUS SOLID BASE CATALYST FOR TRANSESTERIFICATION OF JATROPHA OIL

Heterogeneous catalyst plays a vital role in transesterification process, especially in view of cost
and reusability. In this study, heterogeneous solid base catalyst was prepared by impregnating the
waste animal bone with different weight percent (wt%) KOH solution followed by drying and
calcination at 900 °C for 3 hr. Having screened the catalytic performance and basicity of animal
bone loaded with different K-compounds, 12 wt% KOH loaded on animal bone was chosen. The
physico-chemical properties of animal bone, support and the KOH-impregnated calcined animal
bone catalyst were characterized by means of titration (for basicity of catalyst), Fourier Transform
Infra-Red (FT-IR) spectroscopy and X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) spectroscopy measurements.
Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA) was also performed for the selected catalyst. Catalytic
performance of the catalyst was evaluated by transesterificating Jatropha oil with methanol in
batch reactions. The Box-Behnken Design (BBD) of the Response Surface Methodology (RSM)
was employed to investigate the effects of reaction temperature, catalyst loading and methanol to
oil molar ratio on Fatty Acid Methyl Ester (FAME) yield. Maximum yield of 96.74% was obtained
at 11.56:1 methanol to oil molar ratio, 5.08 wt% catalyst loading, 64.05 oC reaction temperature
and 500 rpm stirring speed in 3 hr reaction time. Reusability studies indicated that the prepared
catalyst could be applied to at least three consecutive batches of the transesterification reaction
without any significant loss of activity