Booth Id:
EGCH032I
Category:
Year:
2015
Finalist Names:
Lam, Stacy
Abstract:
Purpose - To investigate how the ratio for methanol and potassium hydroxide affects the amount of biodiesel, amount of glycerin, and quality of biodiesel when converted from vegetable oil.
Procedure – Collect used vegetable oil and perform titration process. Convert vegetable oil into biodiesel using varying amounts of methanol and KOH. Analyze biodiesel quantity, glycerin quantity and soap quantity to indicate biodiesel quality using soap test.
Conclusion - There was no correlation between the amount of KOH and the amount of biodiesel being produced. The amount of methanol determined the amount of biodiesel produced. It was observed that methanol also determined the quality of the biodiesel based on how much soap the biodiesel contained. Batches with more methanol produced the most biodiesel but batches with less methanol had the lowest soap content.