Effect of Alkaline Metal Catalyst to Transesterification of Jatropha Curcas Oil

Biodiesel is a renewable energy made from oil or fat. It is either vegetable or animal oil or fat. By using catalyst, both substances are processed by triglyceride to modify it to methyl esters. This research concerned was to find out the potency of alkaline metal (IIA) catalyst in processing biodiesel. This process was initiated by testing oil free fatty acid to determine processing method. FFA value is very important in the beginning of process as it correlates to further reaction process. Temperature variation was set on 30o to 70o for 6 hours reaction. Result shows that the best methyl esters value was obtained by using Mg(OH)2, Ca(OH)2and Ba(OH)2 catalysts, respectively in 61,75%; 62,66% and 73,03% on 60oC reaction temperature