Fossil fuels have a high energy density, meaning they contain a significant amount of energy per unit of volume, making them efficient for energy production and transport. Biodiesel is especially becoming a fossil fuel alternative and a key part of renewable energy. Several types of waste from homes, markets, street vendors, and other industrial places were collected and transesterified with Ni-doped ZnO nanoparticles for this study. These included castor oil, coffee grounds, eggshells, vegetable oil, fruit peels, and soybean oil. The Ni-doped ZnO’s were then calcined at 800 °C. The maximum conversion rate found in converting fruit peel waste into biodiesel is about 87.6%, and it was 89.6% when the oil-to-methanal ratio was about 1:2 and the reaction time was 140 min. This is the maximum biodiesel production compared to other wastes. Moreover, using vegetable oil with nanocatalyst, the maximum biodiesel production rate of about 90.58% was recorded with 15% catalyst loading, which is the maximum biodiesel production compared with the other wastes with nanocatalyst. Furthermore, at 75 °C and a concentration of catalyst of about 15% the maximum biodiesel production obtained by using castor oil is about 92.8%. It has the highest biodiesel yield compared with the yield recorded from other waste. The catalyst also demonstrated great stability and reusability for the synthesis of biodiesel. Using waste fruit peels with Ni-doped ZnO helps to progress low-cost and ecologically friendly catalyst for sustainable biodiesel production.

Nanomaterials (NMs) are gradually becoming pervasive in the modern world, entering every application for improving the quality of life. Multifaceted uses of NMs in curing diseases, biomedical instrumentation, bioimaging, drugs, and gene delivery, display devices, nanosensors, and biomarkers in several fields ranging from agriculture to industries, healthcare, and environment, have been well recognized. Carbon-based nanomaterials (CNMs) constitute a major type of NMs with broad-spectrum applications including their uses in agriculture. These are synthesized in large quantities via synthetic and biological approaches. Biological approaches are gaining appreciation and momentum, owing to the advantages associated with them, major being their environment friendly or ‘Green’ nature. This topical review focuses on the preparation of CNMs using natural resources, i.e., using the Green Nanotechnology. The up-to-date compilation presented here includes most of the popular green technological methods of producing the CNMs and their immediate uses as anticancer agents, in bio-labelling, as biosensors, in bio-remediation, in cell imaging, in fluorescent inks, and fluorescent dyes, as plant growth inducing agents, in nano-probes, in light-emitting devices and other applications. It is intended to update the reader with the state-of-the-art knowledge about the green technological methods for synthesizing CNMs, their uses, current trends, challenges, and future outlook on the topic.