Enzyme-catalyzed Transesterification of Soybean Oil into Biodiesel
Biodiesel as methyl esters derived from vegetable oils has considerable advantages in terms of environmental protetion. In the present work, methyl esters were produced from soybean oil by lipase-catalyzed transesterification. To reduce inactivation of commercial immobilized lipases emulsified two-step process was developed using the stepwise addition of methanol with 4:1 molar ratio at 4h intervals. Also with immobilized lipase from Candida antarctica(Novozym 435) high conversion of 98.5 percent was possible at 45℃ of reaction temperature with 4:1 of methanol-to-oil molar ratio and 1%(v/v) methyl glucoside oleic polyester as an emulsifier in the presence of cosolvent.