• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.238-244
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• 2011

Biodiesel, mono-alkyl esters of long chain fatty acids, is one of the alternative fuels derived from renewable lipid feedstock, such as vegetable oils or animal fats. For decade, various lipases have been used for the production of biodiesel. However, the production of biodiesel by enzymatic catalyst has profound restriction in industry application due to high cost. To overcome these problems, many research groups have studied extensively on the selection of cheap oil sources, the screening of suitable lipases, and development of lipase immobilization methods. In this study, we produced biodiesel from plant oil using Proteus vulgaris lipase K80 expressed in Escherichia coli cells. The recombinant lipase K80 was not only expressed in high level but also had high specific lipase activity and high stability in various organic solvents. Lipase K80 could produce biodiesel from olive oil by 3-stepwise methanol feeding method. The immobilized lipase K80 also produced biodiesel using the same 3-stepwise method. The immobilized lipase could produce biodiesel efficiently from various plant oils and waste oils.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.155-160
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• 2011

An animal fat is an attractive biodiesel energy source for its high stability against oxidation and low incomplete combustion ratio due to the high heating value and cetane value. However, it requires a refinery process because of the high content of saturated acid and impurity which increas the boiling point. In this study, the optimum biodiesel synthetic process of lard is suggested. Indeed, we demonstrate new biodiesel production processes to alter conventional process of heating and mixing by applying ultrasonic energy. While the optimum reaction temperature and mole ratio of methanol and lard, when using conventional mixing and heating process, were $55^{\circ}C$ and 12, respectively, the reaction time were reduced to 30 minutes by applying ultrasonic irradiation power of 500 W. The new process applying ultrasonic irradiation yielded synthetic biodiesel properties as followings: 3.34 cP of the viscosity, 37.0 MJ/kg of the caloric value and below 0.25 mgKOH/g of the acidic value, which satisfy biodiesel quality criteria.

• Proceedings of the Korea Institute of Fire Science and Engineering Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.35-40
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• 2008

As the environmental pollution by the drastic increase of vehicles becomes one of the social major concerns, the method of reducing the harmful exhaust emission is being the subject of interest. Utilization of used frying oil as a raw material for biodiesel production is helpful not only for the stable supply of raw materials but also costing down the biodiesel price. This study was conducted the measurement the combustion and thermal characteristics with mixing ratio of biodiesel/diesel fuel. In this study, flash points and fire points were measured by using Tag Closed cup apparatus and Cleveland open cup apparatus. As the result, flash points, fire points and AIT increased with percentage of more contained biodiesel.

• Journal of ILASS-Korea
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.49-58
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• 2009

Non-edible vegetable oils instead of edible vegetable oils as a substitute for diesel fuel are getting a renewed attention because of global reduction of green house gases and concerns for long-term food and energy security. Out of various non-edible vegetable oils, karanja, mahua, linseed, rubber seed and cotton seed oils are selected in this study. A brief review of recent works related to the application of the above five vegetable oils and its derivatives in CI engines is presented. The production technologies of biodiesel based on non-edible vegetable oils are introduced. Problems in vegetable oil or biodiesel fuelled CI engine are included. In addition, future works related to spray characteristics of non-edible vegetable oil or biodiesel from it are discussed. The biodiesel fuel, irrespective of the feedstock used, results in a decrease in the emission of hydrocardon (HC), carbon monoxide (CO), particulate matter (PM) and sulphur dioxide ($SO_2$). It is also said to be carbon neutral as it contributes no net carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Only oxides of nitrogen (NOx) are reported to increase which is due to oxygen content in the biodiesel fuel. The systematic assessment of spray char-acteristics of neat vegetable oils and its blends, neat biodiesel and its blends f3r use as diesel engine fuels is required.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.324-330
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• 2019

To recycle raw fly ash (RFA), a waste from thermal power plants, it was used to prepare solid catalysts which have many advantages compared with homogenous catalysts. When biodiesel was produced from soybean oil using RFA, only 1.2% of biodiesel conversion was obtained. A metal hydroxide, NaOH, KOH or $Ca(OH)_2$, was mixed with the acid-treated fly ash (ATFA), and the mixture was calcined at $700^{\circ}C$ for 3 h to prepare the solid catalyst. The solid catalyst prepared by mixing ATFA with NaOH, designated as SC-Na, showed a better performance than those prepared by mixing ATFA with KOH or $Ca(OH)_2$, respectively. The optimal mass ratio of ATFA with NaOH was 1:3, at which the proportion of $Na_2O$ increased to 60.2% in SC-Na, and 97.8% of biodiesel conversion was achieved under optimal reaction conditions (2 w% SC-Na relative to oil and 5 mL-methanol/g-oil at $50^{\circ}C$ for 4 h). Finally, a batch operation was repeatedly carried out to test the feasibility of reusing the solid catalyst, and more than 96% biodiesel conversion was stably achieved for the third round of operations. This study shows that RFA was successfully recycled to solid catalysts through a simple preparation method, and the solid catalyst was reused for the production of biodiesel with high conversion.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.854-866
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• 2016

The production cost of biodiesel from microalgae is still not competitive, compared with that of petroleum fuels. The genetic improvement of microalgal strains to increase triacylglycerol (TAG) accumulation is one way to reduce production costs. One of the most promising approaches is the isolation of starch-deficient mutants, which have been reported to successfully increase TAG yields. To date, such a stable mutant is not available in an oleaginous marine microalga, despite several advantages of using marine species for biodiesel production. Algae in the genus Dunaliella are known to tolerate high salt concentration and other environmental stresses. In addition, the cultivation processes for large-scale outdoor commercialization have been well established for this genus. In this study, Dunaliella tertiolecta was used to screen for starch-deficient mutants, using an iodine vapor-staining method. Four out of 20,016 UV-mutagenized strains showed a substantial reduction of starch content. A significantly higher TAG content, up to 3-fold of the wild-type level, was observed in three of the mutants upon induction by nitrogen depletion. The carotenoid production and growth characteristics of these mutants, under both normal and oxidative stress conditions, were not compromised, suggesting that these processes are not necessarily affected by starch deficiency. The results from this work open up new possibilities for exploring Dunaliella for biodiesel production.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.50 no.2
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• pp.257-263
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• 2012

Biodiesel is a renewable energy which is nontoxic and acting as a replacement for conventional diesel which derived from fossil fuel. Classified biodiesel producing way such as acid, base, supercritical and enzyme methods, this study focused on eco-friendly production of biodiesel using supercritical and immobilized enzyme process. Assuming a plant with a production rate of 10,000 tons a year, a PRO II simulator program was used to simulate the product conversion rate and total energy consumption. The product conversion in supercritical process and immobilized enzyme was found to be 91.17% (including 0.9% glycerol) and 93.18% (including 1.0% glycerol) respectively. The result shows that the efficiency of immobilized enzyme process is higher compared to supercritical process but having lower end product purity. From the energy consumption point of view, supercritical process consume about 8.9 MW while immobilized enzyme process consume much lower energy which is 3.9 MW. Consequently, this study certifies that energy consumption of supercritical process is 2.3 times higher than immobilized enzyme process.

• Journal of Marine Bioscience and Biotechnology
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.39-44
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• 2016

The microalgae have been studied for a source of biodiesel production. It is important to select the microalgae, which grows rapidly in local environmental conditions such as temperature range and ingredient of local seawater. The aim of this study was isolating microalga, which has rapid growth rate and high FAME contents in wide temperature ranges, for microalgal offshore cultivation in Korea, one of the country with four distinct seasons. Firstly, we had isolated a green microalga, Tetraselmis sp. KCTC12236BP, which has faster growth rate in low temperature (5 and $10^{\circ}C$) than Tetraselmis suecica and Dunaliella tertiolecta LB999 from Young Heung Island, Incheon, Korea. This microalga was cultivated in outdoor circulated tank photobioreactor (CT-PBR). As a result, this microalga could grow in wide temperature ranges (6 to $29^{\circ}C$), outdoors. After that, the biomass was recovered, and 13.2 g biodiesel could be acquired from 110 g dry biomass. These results indicate that the isolated microalga, Tetraselmis sp. KCTC12236BP is proper to biodiesel production using outdoor cultivation in Korea for all seasons.

• 한국생물공학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.164-168
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• 2003

Fatty acid methyl esters (FAMEs) show large potential applications as diesel substitutes, and they are known as biodiesel fuel. Biodiesel fuel as a renewable energy is an alternative that can reduce energy dependence on petroleum and air pollution. Several processes for the production of biodiesel fuel have been developed. Transesterification process under alkali-catalysis and short-chain alcohol gives high level yield of methyl esters in short reaction times. In this research, transesterification of rapeseed oil was investigated to produce the FAMEs. Experimental reaction conditions included molar ratio of oil to alcohol, concentration of catalyst, types of catalysts, reaction time, and reaction temperature. The conversion ratio of rapeseed oil enhanced with the alcohol-oil mixing ratio and with the reaction temperature.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.459-463
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• 2015

This study evaluated the microbial conversion of coconut oil waste, a major agro-residue in tropical countries, into single cell oil (SCO) feedstock for biodiesel production. Copra cake was used as a low-cost renewable substrate without any prior chemical or enzymatic pretreatment for submerged growth of an oleaginous tropical mangrove fungus, Aspergillus terreus IBB M1. The SCO extracted from fermented biomass was converted into fatty acid methyl esters (FAMEs) by transesterification and evaluated on the basis of fatty acid profiles and key fuel properties for biodiesel. The fungus produced a biomass (8.2 g/l) yielding 257 mg/g copra cake SCO with ~98% FAMEs. The FAMEs were mainly composed of saturated methyl esters (61.2%) of medium-chain fatty acids (C12-C18) with methyl oleate (C18:1; 16.57%) and methyl linoleate (C18:2; 19.97%) making up the unsaturated content. A higher content of both saturated FAMEs and methyl oleate along with the absence of polyunsaturated FAMEs with ≥4 double bonds is expected to impart good fuel quality. This was evident from the predicted and experimentally determined key fuel properties of FAMEs (density, kinematic viscosity, iodine value, acid number, cetane number), which were in accordance with the international (ASTM D6751, EN 14214) and national (IS 15607) biodiesel standards, suggesting their suitability as a biodiesel fuel. The low cost, renewable nature, and easy availability of copra cake, its conversion into SCO without any thermochemical pretreatment, and pelleted fungal growth facilitating easier downstream processing by simple filtration make this process cost effective and environmentally favorable.