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No. of pages: 72

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Abstract:

Coconut seeds were investigated for their use as biodiesel feedstock. Oil was extracted from coconut seeds using the soxhlet extraction method where a 67.2% yield of oil was obtained. Biodiesel synthesis was developed and optimized using Box-Behnken design in Response Surface Methodology to study the effect of experimental variables such as methanol to oil ratio, catalyst concentration, reaction temperature, and reaction time on the extracted oil from coconut seeds.
The model shows optimum conditions of biodiesel yield of 79% were found at 6:1 alcohol/oil ratio, 1% catalyst concentration (KOH), reaction temperature of 650C, and reaction time of 40 min. respectively. At the end of the experimental design, it was found that the catalyst concentration and reaction time significantly affect the biodiesel yield more than the molar ratio among others under the range of values studied. The produced biodiesel was analyzed for its physicochemical and characterized for its fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) profile using GC-MS.
The fuel properties of biodiesel obtained showed that except for cetane number, diesel index, and sulphur content that were higher than the recommended ASTM values all other determined properties were within the ASTM specification indicating that it's quite suitable as an alternative source of fuel.