Performance of carbon from coffee grounds activated with zinc chloride in purification of cooking oil used for biodiesel production.

• Grant number: 24/08243-4
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: July 01, 2024
• End date: June 30, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Materials and Metallurgical Engineering - Nonmetallic Materials
• Principal Investigator: Luciana de Simone Cividanes Coppio
• Grantee: Gustavo Bressanim Cavalheiro da Costa
• Host Institution: Divisão de Ciências Fundamentais (IEF). Instituto Tecnológico de Aeronáutica (ITA). Ministério da Defesa (Brasil). São José dos Campos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

In the current economic and environmental context, research into sustainable technologies has gained the attention of several countries. In this sense, the production of biofuels from residual biomass, such as used oil, is widely explored, mainly in European countries. In Brazil, there is competition between the food sector and the production of these biofuels, as occurs with the production of biodiesel from refined oil, with the use of organic waste as raw material being little explored. Thus, the use of residual biomass for the synthesis of biodiesel can be further explored in the Brazilian scenario. Therefore, the present project aims to study the purification of used cooking oil for the subsequent synthesis of biodiesel. For this, charcoal produced from coffee grounds and activated with zinc chloride will be used to remove free fatty acids and peroxides from the oil, which arise due to frying conditions and can compromise biodiesel production. Purification conditions will also be analyzed, such as: temperature; agitation and concentration of the purifying agent. The oil will be characterized before and after purification with measurements of acidity, peroxides, viscosity and density. Coal analyzes will also be carried out using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) and specific surface area analysis using the Brunauer-Emmett Teller (BET) method. Therefore, the project aims to achieve qualitative and quantitative gains in performance, cost and sustainability in the production of biofuels, contributing to the strengthening of the Brazilian industry, which still faces challenges related to technological, logistical and economic issues in this area.