OK...I am learning here, so if my terminology is not correct, please forgive me! :-)

I have heard of and trying to find additional information of the process that uses soybean oil, ethanol and phosphoric acid which makes this an additive to diesel fuel. I read this about this, and thought that I had placed the article in my "favorites" but, evidentally, I did not. So, if anyone has any information or even could direct to in the right direction to obtain this information, I would TRULY be appreciative!

Thanks again everyone!

quote:

the process that uses soybean oil, ethanol and phosphoric acid which makes this an additive to diesel fuel.

Add a catalyst to that list (KOH or NaOH) and it sound like Acid Esterfication followed by Base Transesterfication, which would be the production of Biodiesel...which is pretty much what we are all about 'round here.

Start with The Collaborative Biodiesel Tutorial, upper left side, "Getting Started", and read at least those first 6 topics. That covers the Base part, and if you can grasp all that, then you might want to move on to the Acid part, which isn't any more complicated if you understood the Base half, and isn't even necessary for ever batch of soybean (or any biological) oil.

You might be thinking of a regular transesterification (alkaline lye-catalyzed) biodiesel process, with the following variations:

-ethanol instead of methanol is possible but it's EXTREMELY hard to get good conversion and has some other problems. It's hard to test with any 'backyard' tests as the 3/27 test doesn't always seem to work, since ethanol-based biodiesel is very soluble in methanol

-some commercial producers use phosphoric acid to neutralize a little bit of the leftover catalyst after the biodiesel reaction is finished. There are problems with this and it's unneccessary to use phosphoric acid anyway (cheaper acids work fine), so on this forum many people do'nt recommend trying to neutralize.

First off...thanks you two, for the advice so far...let me see if I can complicate this even farther!!! LOL

In this article, it stated that the phosphoric acid was the catalyst. In this process, there was no soap formation and the glycerin was "absorbed" back into the fuel. The process was, from memory, soybean oil+ethanol+phosphoric acid, then pressurized and heated (heating came from the pressurization) which burned off the water at the same time, and the end product was the finished product, an additive to petro-diesel.

Supposedly, this is a fairly new process and is used a great deal in Finland (I think). This article provided information on the entire process, including the concentration of Phosphoric acid, amount used ratio, etc. I have been researching for this article again for 2 weeks now, and was just hoping on a prayer that someone in here may have heard of this process.

Thanks again folks...and please, keep your comments coming!!!

You might get more of a response by posting in the ethanol forum, or asking forum member mensafarmer about this- he's probably aware of the technique you're talking about.