Thermophysical properties of biodiesel and related systems. Part I. Vapour–liquid equilibrium at low pressures of binary and ternary systems involving methanol, ethanol, glycerol, water and NaCl

Experimental vapour–liquid equilibrium data of several binary mixtures (methanol + glycerol), (ethanol + glycerol) and (glycerol + water) and ternary (methanol + glycerol + water), (ethanol + glycerol + water) and (water + glycerol + NaCl) were obtained over the pressure range of 6.7 kPa to 66.7 kPa through an Othmer-type ebulliometer, allowing the construction of temperature – mass fraction and pressure – temperature diagrams. It is shown that the systems without NaCl were satisfactorily represented by the UNIQUAC model with good agreement between theory and experimental results. It was observed that alcohol concentrations lower than 10 wt% increase the phase transition temperature. The systems investigated show positive deviations in relation to Raoult’s law. Results presented in this work may be relevant in process design towards efficient recovering of components in the biodiesel down-stream processes.

► Experimental vapour–liquid equilibrium data of multicomponent mixtures of biodiesel-related systems. ► Othmer-type ebulliometer in the pressure range of 6.7 to 66.7 kPa. ► Experimental data satisfactorily represented by the UNIQUAC model.