The work on this was done at the US Dept of Agriculture Philadelphia in 1997

I've been trying to find the full report with this title. Does anybody know where I should look? All I can find is the synopsis, which gives no detail of how the process works.

This should be the full detail
Lipase-Catalyzed Production of Biodiesel Document ref 6329
Authors: L.A. Nelson, T.A. Foglia and W.N. Marmer
Keywords: Alcoholysis, alkyl esters, biodiesel, grease, lipase, rapeseed, soy oil, tallow

I've done a few copernic pro searches and it's come up with nothing.

Looks like it will be the same as my UV / chlorinisation searches .

Nig

...over in the Using FFA for Biodiesel thread. She contacted Dr. Foglia
directly, and he's one of the authors of the paper you're hunting. I'm
afraid you'll find the immobilized lipase is pretty expensive stuff --
for universities only....hope I'm wrong.o

I did some poking around -- Amano is based in Japan, but they
have an office in Lombard, Illinois, and an 800 number:

Amano Enzyme USA Co. Ltd.
1157 North Main Street
Lombard IL 60148
800-446-7652

Also a website [Amano Enzyme

They have a wide range of lipases for commercial use. Let us know if you
find anything usable for biodiesel.

Do any of you have recent experiences with
use of immobilized lipases for production of
biodiesel and possible benefits compared to
chemical synthesis

I have never heard of anyone who has tried this outside a 'proper' lab. It has always interested me and if some guanidine fell off the back of a lorry near me, I would certainly give it a go.

Non-Ionic Base-Catalyzed Processes
In order to obtain milder reaction conditions and to simplify manipulations, a great number of organic bases has been developed and used as catalyst or reactant for organic syntheses. Among these bases, amines such as triethylamine49,50, piperidine49, 1,2,2,6,6 pentamethylpiperidine49,51, pyridine49,50,51, 2,6-di-tert-butylpyridine49,51 and 4-dimethyl-aminopyridine1,52 (DMAP); amidines such as 1,8-diazabicyclo[5.4.0]undec-7-ene1,49,50,51 (DBU) and
1,5-diazabicyclo[4.3.0]non-5-ene49,51,53 (DBN); guanidines such as 1,5,7-triazabicyclo[4.4.0]dec-5-ene50,54 (TBD), 1,1,3,3-tetramethylguanidine55,56,57 (TMG), 1,1,2,3,3-pentabutylguanidine58(PBG), 1,3 diphenylguanidine59, 1,2,3-triphenylguanidine60,61 and amino- and nitroguanidines62; triamino(imino)phosphoranes such as tert-butylimino-2-diethylamino-1,3-dimethyl-perhydro-1,3,2- diazaphosphorane51
(BEMP) and tris(dimethylamino)methyliminophosphorane51(Me7P), shown in Scheme 9, are frequently used in organic synthesis.
The activity and efficiency of such non-ionic bases as catalysts for the transesterification of vegetable oils were studied. In a first series of studies, the catalytic activity of some guanidines was compared to that observed using
other bases such as the amidines DBU and DBN, and the triamino(imino)phosphoranes BEMP and Me7P63. It was observed that TBD, even if applied at only 1 mol%, produces more than 90% of methyl esters after 1 h. Using the other bases, under the same experimental conditions, the yields were not higher than 66% (Table 1). The order of the
catalytic activity is not directly related to the relative basicity of these compounds, since BEMP and Me7P should be the more efficient catalysts, followed by TBD. However, the guanidines are more active catalysts and the activity follows their relative basicity. According to the observed results and to the mechanism of the base-catalyzed transesterification (Scheme 6), it
seems that the good performance of TBD, when compared to BEMP and Me7P, is related to its kinetic activity. The catalytic site (unshared electron pair of the sp2 N) of TBD is practically unhindered (Scheme 10), allowing an easy access of the methanol for proton transfer, while the steric hindrance shown by the triamino(imino)phosphoranes is so significant that they are practically inert to alkylating agents, such as isopropyl bromide, as well as extremely
resistant to react with thionyl chloride and thiophosgene51. Other bases such as DMAP, pyridine and triethylamine were also tested. However, even at 5 mol%, these amines
did not give satisfactory yields. DMAP was the most active within this series, producing only 20% of methyl esters after 1 h.
In a second series of studies, the catalytic activity of TBD was compared to that observed for typical industrial catalysts (e.g. NaOH and K2CO3)37-39. The results of this study63 are shown in Table 2. The reaction yields obtained
with TBD were close to those observed with NaOH and no undesirable by-products such as soaps (easily formed when alkaline metal hydroxides are used) were observed. When compared to potassium carbonate, TBD was always more active, even at low molar concentrations. Although TBD is
less active than sodium methoxide (at only 0.5%, CH3ONa produces more than 98% of methyl esters after 30 min), its use does not require any special condition.
The text all comes from this paper:

Happy reading!

H

Hi HCR,
Most of this heavy chemical stuff is beyond me, but what is TBD, and how would one go about getting a sample?
I suppose its the sort of stuff that has to be made up, especially for the process?

H.C. Non Ionic Non Active brain Div. SWC.

I am sorry, I don't really know any more about it than you.

I have thought about pricing it up for a while, but as the MeOH process is not causing me any real bother, I haven't really been motivated.

It wouldn't surprise me if it was expensive or difficult to store or both, but I will ask around and see what I can find out.

H

Dave, the article you're looking for is on the web at the link above.

V-P