Quality control in biodiesel production plants

Biodiesel production plants should control process parameters to produce high-quality products of desired physicochemical properties while meeting international quality standards and at low production costs and environmental footprints. These process parameters should be analyzed during all production subprocesses through the data collected, which could be used by operators or transferred to the control unit to manage the production process. Overall, feedstock characteristics, pretreatment processes, transesterification reactor management, product purification, alcohol and catalyst recycling, as well as waste valorization and treatments, are among the important elements to be optimized to achieve an economically viable biodiesel product while mitigating environmental issues. In light of the above, this chapter assesses crucial parameters that affect product quality and cost while critically discussing innovative equipment, instruments, additives, and procedures developed in the industrial biodiesel production processes to enhance product quality.