摘要：The increasing pollution in the atmospheric layer has meant world-wide temperature variations, causing the melting of icecaps and floods, among other environmental factors. This change in temperature has been mainly caused by the indiscriminate emission of CO2, especially due to the rising number of vehicles in circulation. Researchers have identified that, among other types of fuel, diesel has the highest level of CO2 emission. Hence the need for the development of biodiesel, produced from oleaginous plants, aimed at reducing the emission of this harmful gas into the atmosphere, besides using renewable resources. However, as in any automation process, it is necessary to have sensors, actuators, and controllers, which together perform the automation and control of the production process. Besides that, there are other process variables to be accounted for, such as temperature, flow, and level. Considering such concept, and within the academic context, the creation process of a mini biodiesel plant will be described.

摘要：The main propose of this research was to develop a two-step biodiesel production technique from animal fat as a raw material. The developed process consists ofesterification and transesterification steps. With special attention to optimize the first step is acid catalyzed esterification to reduce free fatty acid content and the second step is alkali catalyzed transesterification for converting triglyceride to fatty acid methyl ester or biodiesel. Animal fat containing 78.80 mg KOH/g of high acid value and molecular weight of 851 g/mol with the highest oleic acid content was used as raw material. Respond surface methodology （RSM） was applied for the experiment design. This were 20 experiments involving the three investigated variables of methanol to animal fat ratio, amount of sulfuric acid catalyst and reaction time that were studied on esterification to optimize the condition for decreasing acid value in animal fat less than 2 mg KOH/g. The animal fat with low acid value was further experimented in transesterification step to obtain fatty acid methyl ester or biodiesel. Animal fat biodiesel is further investigated by determining its fuel properties according to the ASTM standard test method.

摘要：One possible application for the excess of glycerol, which is an exceeding byproduct in biodiesel industry, was used as carbon and energy sources for bioproducts synthesis. This work aims to evaluate biosurfactant production from glycerol by Pseudomonas aeruginosa EQ 109 isolated from crude oil-contaminated soil. Factorial design 2^3 was utilized to optimize the amount of biosurfactant produced, by using pH （A）, initial biomass concentration （B）, and initial glycerol concentration （C） as independent factors. The experiments were carried out in flasks containing 100 mL of mineral medium. Biosurfactant production was monitored by increase of the emulsification of aviation kerosene （E24） and surface tension reduction （STr）. The results have shown that, at pH = 7.0, in order to increase E24, variables as B and C are the most influential, leading to a maximum value of E24 = 79%, as well as for an increase of GC （GCmax = 49%）. STR was the variable with the best correlation factor for the proposed linear model （R2=0.96） and its maximum value was 48%. Xfwas not significant to the model, although it was influenced by pH and C, with C = 40g/L （Xfmax = 4.56 g/L）.