One-step Biodiesel Production from Yellow Grease

To make biodiesel production profitable, the biodiesel producers are forced to turn to lower cost, waste-based yellow grease. However, the problem with yellow grease is that it contains high concentrations of free fatty acids that pose significant processing problems in the alkali-catalyzed processes. The current two-step commercial processes used to convert yellow grease to biodiesel incur added costs for pretreatment of the yellow grease before transesterification to remove the free fatty acids by the addition of extra alkaline catalyst or esterification of the free fatty acids using a homogeneous acid catalyst, eliminating the advantage of the cheaper raw material. This proposed project concerns the development and commercialization of an innovative technology to convert yellow grease to low cost biodiesel in a ONE-STEP process. The success of this project will provide a highly efficient, cost-effective, and simplified process for one-step biodiesel production from yellow grease.