Website created by Colin Wood and Tristan Sandhu

Discussion

Transesterification

The transesterification process is essential to producing a biodiesel. The process involves an oil and an alcohol. In this lab we used Jatropha oil because it can be used in many different diesel engines; the plant is carbon neutral because the carbon emissions produced are offset by the plant and Jatropha trees can be grown in nutrient poor soil. After performing the transesterification process we were left with a raw biodiesel and glycerol. The lab room we worked in was not the ideal place. The room was at a low temperature which allowed the biodiesel to solidify. This proved to be a slight problem because we would need to lower the temperature of the biodiesel so it would turn into a liquid so we could isolate the biodiesel and the glycerol.

 

Cloud Point

Our experiments showed that when Jatropha oil was mixed with ethanol and the diesel additive it produced the most effective results. After 40 minutes this mixture reached -15^oC and had not yet formed a solid. These results showed that Jatropha biodiesel with ethanol and a diesel additive could potentially be used in Canada as an alternate to diesel. Testing the cloud point of the solutions allowed us to simulate the temperatures of a Canadian winter. We checked our solutions every 5 minutes to allow us to determine at what temperature the solution formed a gel. Using out results we were able to predict which mixtures would prove to be most effective in cold temperatures. The mixture of Jatropha, ethanol and the diesel additive proved to be more effective then just the Jatropha/ethanol solution and Jatropha/diesel additive solution, these two solutions rose to -15^oC after 40 minutes but solidified.

Flash Point

Testing the flash point allowed us to see how long it took the substance to start burning on its own. The most effective flash point came from a combination of the Jatropha oil, ethanol, diesel additive and Wintron XC30. That mixture started to burn twice as fast as any of the other test solutions. This solution started to burn in only 30 seconds. Once this solution started to burn its flames were quite violent and produced black smoke. Our second fastest time was 1 minute and 5 seconds which consisted of Jatropha, ethanol and diesel additive. This flame also burned with black smoke but didn’t produce as much as the Jatropha oil, ethanol, diesel additive and Wintron XC30.