Transesterification reaction to produce biodiesel consists of
a series of consecutive reversible reactions (Fig. 1) to produce 3 mol
of ester and glycerol as a co-product[1e3]. Edible vegetable oils
such as palm oil, sunflower oil, rapeseed oil and soybean oil are
generally suitable feedstocks for biodiesel production [4,5].
However, non-edible oils such as Karanja oil, Polanga oil and
Jatropha oil have attracted great attention as they do not face the
‘food vs fuel’ dilemma when used as feedstocks in fuel industry