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Chemical Technology • February 2015
Results
Methanol vs. ethanol using KOH as a catalyst
(experiment 3 and 4)
Figure 1 on page 9 shows the impact assessment associ-
ated with the production of 1 kg of biodiesel using the
waste cooking oil and KOH using methanol (experiment 3)
compared to that of using ethanol (experiment 4) using the
‘ECO-Indicator 99 (E) V2.08 / Europe EI 99 E/E’ method.
Out of the 11 impact categories, experiment 3 has higher
contributions on radiation, ozone layer depletion, land
use and fossil fuels. It shows lower impacts on the human
health categories; 80 % carcinogens, 39 % on respiratory
organics and 92 % contribution on the respiratory inorgan-
ics. Experiment 3 also shows lower impact on toxicity and
eutrophication as well as on the minerals.
KOH vs NaOH catalyst, using methanol
When comparing biodiesel production using the ‘ECO-
Indicator 99 (E) V2.08 / Europe EI 99 E/E’ method, using
KOH or NaOH catalysts with methanol for the esterification
process, Figure 2, the impact assessment shows that the
biodiesel with NaOH as a catalyst has higher contributions
on 9 impact categories except the minerals and the radia-
tion categories. The use of KOH catalyst has however shown
lower contributions for the rest of the impact categories.
The respiratory inorganics were reduced by approximately
82 %, climate change by 23 %, while radiation, ozone layer
depletion and eco-toxicity were reduced by approximately
29 %, 32 % and 40 % respectively. Eutrophication was
reduced by 71 %; land use was reduced by 3,5 % and the
use of fossil fuels reduced by almost 7 %.
Figure 4: LCA results using ECO-indicator 99 analysis method to
compare all the experiments
Figure 3: Impact assessment results of biodiesel from metha-
nol using different amounts of alcohol, Eco- indicator 99 (E)
V2.08 / Europe EI 99 E/E’ method/ characterisation