[Studies of enzymatic synthesis of biodiesel]

Biodiesel, an alternative diesel fuel, fatty acid alkyl ester, is made from renewable biological sources such as vegetable oils and animal fats. Two processes for biodiesel synthesis, enzymatic lipase catalytic esterification from fatty acid and transesterification from oils and fats, was investigated. The effects of various lipases, enzyme amount and purity, solvent, water absorbent, inhibition of short chains alcohol, specificity of substrate, molar ratio of substrate on esterification were studied in detail. The esterification degree with the optimal parameter and process can reach up to 92%. The purity of biodiesel obtained by separation and purification is up to 98%, and the half-life of the immobilized lipase for the esterification process can be up to 360hr, Moreover, the preliminary studies of the transesterification including the amount of methanol and mode of adding methanol into reaction system were made. The transesterification degree with adding methanol stepwise can reach 83%.