European biodiesel standards

Without the Biodiesel Standard, there would be no sustainable biodiesel market. The Biodiesel Standard guarantees that products are properly tested for blend properties, performance in engine use, and functionality with injection systems used in the modern common rail diesel engines. Many car manufacturers state that FAME used in commercial fuel must meet both standard references EN14214, the European Biodiesel Standard, and ASTM D 6751, the U. S. Biodiesel Standard (Table 3.1). Making biodiesel that complies with the applicable Biodiesel Standard helps guarantee the functionality and performance in transport engines. 

With an easy click the Biodiesel Cost Optimizer can select for European Biodiesel Standard EN 14214, or U. S. Biodiesel Standard ASTM D 6751. If needed other target values can be input manually. 

The ASTM standard does not give restriction to the iodine value of methyl esters but the European biodiesel standard (EN 14214) states that the iodine value should be no more than 120. JCME is within the requirements of EN 14214. The iodine number of conventional (automotive) diesel fuel is reported to be 10. Based on the results shown in Table 2, the iodine value of the methyl esters differs only slightly from that of their parent oil. The iodine value derived from the GC-MS chromatograms are higher than those derived from the Wijs solution method, mainly because Equation 1 assumes full iodonization and treats all the double bonds as being equally reactive to oxidation. ... 

Biodiesel standards have been or are being developed in many countries or regions around the world. The American biodiesel standard ASTM D6751 and the European biodiesel standard EN 14214 are standards that have been utilized by other countries when developing their own standards. The current versions of ASTM D6751 and EN 14214 are summarized in Table 16.2. 

In the modern 00-rape the > C 20 fatty acids have been reduced to trace fractions in favour of oleic, linoleic and linolenic acids, resulting in a fatty acids spectrum similar to olive oil. Characteristics of 00-rape are the most appropriate to fulfil the European biodiesel standards. As a result, the EU-27 are now the by far largest rapeseed oil consumers, and the astounding growth in European demand has been driven almost exclusively by the expansion of the biofuels sector over recent years. Fifty percent of European rapeseed production in 2005 has been turned into biodiesel, 37% has been used for human consumption, 7% for oleochemical products and lubricants 6% has been exported. In 2007 the rape oil demand for biofuels has accounted for 60% of rape oil consumption. Rape-based biofuels include biodiesel and direct use as refined oil. 

The desired properties of methyl esters for biodiesel are given in Table 24 (147). These properties are the German biodiesel standard Deutsche Industrie Norm (DIN) V 511605. This standard, as well as other European standards, was developed, especially with canola/rapeseed oil as the starting material in mind. The suggested... 

The major biodiesel standards are ASTM D 6751 [669] and the European EN 14214 [670] standard, whose requirements are somewhat equivalent At present D 6751 applies to BlOO biodiesel that is used for blending. Among the many parameters controlled by this standard are the concentrations of sodium, potassium, magnesium, and calcium in biodiesel. Alkali and alkaline-earth metals in the fuel can form ash and soaps, which may cause detrimental deposits in engines. To prevent engine damage firom the blended fuels, these cations are limited to a cumulative concentration of less than 5 mg/L for the alkali metals sodium and potassium and for the alkaline-earth metals magnesium and calcium. 

Anon., 2003a), requires CN > 40, while those for biodiesel prescribe minimums of 47 for ASTM standard D 6751 (Anon., 2007a) and 51 for European Committee for Standardization (CEN) standard EN 14214 (Anon., 2003b). Due to the high CNs of many fatty compounds, which can exceed the cetane scale, the term lipid combustion quality number for these compounds was suggested (Freedman et al, 1990). 

The Biodiesel Stability (BIOSTAB) project, supported by the European Commission, was initiated in 2001 to establish clear criteria and analytical methods for the monitoring biodiesel fuel stability (Various, 2003 Prankl, 2002). The resulting unified method, EN 14112 (Anon., 2003c) established a means for measuring oxidative stability utilizing the Rancimat or oxidation stability instruments. This test method was essentially developed from standards employed in the fats and oils industry to measure isothermally the induction period for oxidation of fatty derivatives. At present, both biodiesel fuel standards ASTM D 6751 (Anon., 2007a) and EN 14214 (Anon., 2003b) include an oxidative stability specification based on measurement by method EN 14112. 

Prankl, H. 2002. High Biodiesel Quality Required by European Standards. Eur. J. Lipid Sci. Technol.,104, 371-375. 

Five diesel fuels with different formulations were tested, a commercial diesel ( standard diesel) available at European gas stations, biodiesel (rape oil methyl ester) and three sulphur-reduced diesel fuels containing defined amounts of aromatic hydrocarbons (see Table 1). 

Biodiesel has been used commercially in several countries for up to 20 years, either as pure FAME or blended with petrodiesel [5]. The European and the American standards for biodiesel (EN14214 and ASTM D 6751) specify allowable limits for a large number of physical and chemical parameters. Rapeseed methyl ester (RME) meets these quality specifications, whereas FAME from other sources may have to be blended to meet the requirements [5],... 

Tables 6 contains, respectively, the properties of FAMES collected from the literature and the results of the prediction of quality parameters of oleaginous yeast and microalgae (Lacerda et al. 2013) compared with the American, European, and Brazilian standards. The values of heat of combustion (HC), index of oxidative stability (OSI) and iodine value (II) are out of limits imposed by these standards, however, the values of density (p), viscosity (u) and cetane number (CN) are within it. Even though the indexes are slightly out of bounds, the biodiesel obtained from Chlorella vulgaris and Lipomyces starkeyi may still be used as fuel.

The specifications for biodiesel are designed to ensure that consumers will not experience operational problems from the fuel s use. ASTM and European Union have standard specifications designed for BlOO FAME used in biodiesel blending, which include GC (gas chromatographic analysis), elemental analysis, as well as physicochemical properties of the produced biodiesel [3,4]. Quality fuel will provide the consumer with improved air quality and enhanced operability. Poor quality fuel will create operability problems and increased maintenance activity. It is really necessary to look for newer approaches for the production of biodiesel particularly for variable quality feed stock employing nonedible oils or used flying oils. 

Besides CP (ASTM D2500) and PP (ASTM D97), two test methods for the low-temperature flow properties of conventional DF exist, namely the low-temperature flow test (LTFT used in North America ASTM D4539), and cold filter plugging point (CFPP used outside North America for example the European standard EN 116) (CEN). These methods have also been used to evaluate biodiesel and its blends with No. 1 and No. 2 conventional DF. Low-temperature filterability tests were stated to be necessary because of better correlation with operability tests than CP or PP (Owen and Coley, 1995). However, for fuel formulations containing at least 10 vol% methyl esters, both LTFT and CFPP are linear functions of CP (Dunn and Bagby, 1995). Additional statistical analysis showed a strong 1 1 correlation between LTFT and CP (Dunn and Bagby, 1995). 

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