Production and Analysis of Biodiesel from Non-Edible Seed Oil of <i>Pistacia Chinensis</i>

Abstract

Pistacia Chinensis is a potential and suitable non-edible feedstock for biodiesel production in China. In the present paper, three extraction methods to obtain seed oil of Pistacia Chinensis were compared and the Soxhlet extraction was found as the most effective one. Two kinds of biodiesels were produced catalyzed homogeneously by sodium hydroxide from crude oil of Pistacia Chinensis in Hebei province and Jiangsu province. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was used to compare the alterations of the functional groups in the crude oils and their biodiesel products after transesterification, and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and gas chromatography were used to compare the composition of the biodiesels qualitatively and quantitatively. The results show that the C 18 fatty acid methyl esters are the main components in both the biodiesels, and the seed oil of Pistacia Chinensis from Hebei province is more suitable for biodiesel production than that from Jiangsu province in terms of their chemical structure.