triglycerides in vegetable oil react with alcohol to form a
mixture of glycerol and fatty acid alkyl esters, called biodiesel.
Biodiesel produced from vegetable oils can be used as an
alternative to diesel fuels because its characteristics are similar
to those of petroleum-based diesel fuels. For example, they
have a viscosity close to that of petroleum-based diesel fuel,
their volumetric heating values are a little lower, but they have
high cetane and flash points [1]. Many types of alcohols such as
methanol and ethanol can be used in the transesterification. If
methanol is used, the resulting biodiesel is fatty acid methyl ester
(FAME), which has proper viscosity, boiling point and high
cetane number [