Light biodiesel from macaúba and palm kernel: Properties of their blends with fossil kerosene in the perspective of an alternative aviation fuel

Juliana Quierati da Silva, Douglas Queiroz Santos, José Domingos Fabris, Luiz Vitor Leonardi Harter and Samuel Peres Chagas

Renewable Energy, 2020, vol. 151, issue C, 426-433

Abstract: Oil either from macaúba (Acrocomia aculeate) and palm (Elaeis guineensis) fruit kernel was transesterified with methanol through the classical reaction with homogeneous alkaline catalyst. The produced fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) were further fractionated via atmospheric distillation as a step to obtain enriched fractions in short-molecular chain esters, ranging from C8 to C14, in a perspective to be blended with the conventional mineral jet fuel (Jet A-1). In this report, such blends of light biodiesels with Jet A-1 kerosene are described for their density, distillation fractions according to the temperature, structure changes under thermal treatments, by thermogravimetry and differential calorimetry analyses, freezing point, flash point, and calorific value. The blends corresponding to 5, 10 and 20 vol% in enriched short-chain esters with kerosene revealed values well within the recommended limits by the ASTM D1655. Light biodiesels, which are rich in lauric acid (C12:0) methyl esters are suitable to be blended with the Jet A-1 kerosene up to at least 5 vol%. Those blends could produce virtually very similar fuels, regarding the main technical standard properties, to the conventional fossil kerosene for jet engines, particularly concerning the moisture content, the density, its behavior in distillation and the flash point.

Keywords: Light biodiesel; Macaúba; Palm kernel; Alternative jet fuel; Air-fuel blends (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960148119317161
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:renene:v:151:y:2020:i:c:p:426-433

DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2019.11.035

Access Statistics for this article

Renewable Energy is currently edited by Soteris A. Kalogirou and Paul Christodoulides

More articles in Renewable Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().