Biodiesel is a fatty acid alkyl ester which is renewable, biodegradable and non-toxic fuel which can be derived from any vegetable oil and animal fats. Vegetable oils and animal fats in their raw form have high viscosity that makes them unsuitable as fuels for diesel engines. Transesterification is one of the well-known process by which fats and oils are converted into biodiesel. The reaction o...

Anaerobic digestion is a biotechnology that can be used to convert various biodegradable organic materials into methane-rich biogas fuel. The anaerobic digestion of municipal solid waste and sewage sludge is a process that has become a promising technology in waste management throughout the world .Digestion occurs in a four-step process: hydrolysis, acidogenesis, acetogenesis and methanogenesis...

Biodiesel is usually produced from food-grade vegetable oils that are more expensive than diesel fuel. Therefore, biodiesel produced from food-grade vegetable oil is currently not economically feasible. Waste cooking oils, restaurant grease and animal fats are potential feedstocks for biodiesel. These inexpensive feedstocks represent one-third of the US total fats and oil production, but are cu...

The aim of this study is to investigate the utilization of silkworm cocoon waste, such as pierced or stained cocoons, as a sorbent material for the removal of motor and vegetable oils from water. The oil-sorption capacity, rate and reusability of the material were evaluated. The results show the high sorption capacity of the silkworm cocoon waste sorbent (42-52 g(oil)/g(sorbent) for motor oil a...

The two-step catalyzing process for biodiesel production from waste vegetable oil was assisted by both co-solvent and microwave irradiation. Central composite design (CCD) was employed to optimize the reaction conditions. Optimal reaction conditions of the first step were alcohol to oil molar ratio of 9:1, catalyst (H2SO4) amount 1 wt%, reaction temperature 333 K, and reaction time 7.5 minutes;...

The economic feasibilities of four continuous processes to produce biodiesel, including both alkali- and acid-catalyzed processes, using waste cooking oil and the 'standard' process using virgin vegetable oil as the raw material, were assessed. Although the alkali-catalyzed process using virgin vegetable oil had the lowest fixed capital cost, the acid-catalyzed process using waste cooking oil w...

Recommendations towards a food supply system framework that will deliver healthy food in a sustainable way. In 2007, Emily Morgan was one of fifteen Americans to be granted a Fulbright Postgraduate Scholarship to Australia. A Tufts University postgraduate student and former Mount Holyoke College graduate, Emily carried out her Fulbright research on the relationship between food, health and the ...

Over 380000 tons of vegetable waste is produced annually in the “Campo de Dalías” zone (Almería, Spain), deriving from the diverse existing crops grown under plastic cover). Landfills containing this vegetable waste are a potential breeding ground for diseases and pests, they can also be the subject of uncontrolled burning, cause a riverbed blockage and, at the same time, they are an unsightly ...

Composting is a good recycling method to fully utilise all the organic wastes present in kitchen waste due to its high nutritious matter within the waste. In this present study, the optimised mixture proportions of kitchen waste containing vegetable scraps (V), fish processing waste (F) and newspaper (N) or onion peels (O) were determined by applying the simplex-centroid mixture design method t...