Purification of crude glycerol by column chromatography

Abstract

Crude glycerol is a dark viscosity substance and contained only 54% glycerol which could not be readily used in any industry except to be burnt as fuel. In order to add more value to the substance, we found the way to increase the purity of crude glycerol by using column chromatography. To prepare the substance for column chromatography, we began by using sulfuric acid at pH2 to agglomerate salt. Salt and other substances were removed by filtration process. Decolorization was also done at this step using charcoal. The next step was to adjust the pH to 6 in order to get the best charcoal precipitation. The charcoal precipitation was filtered using vacuum filtering process. After that partially purified glycerol was heated for 120 minutes in order to remove methanol and water. At this point the glycerol purity was at 89%. Finally, we put 89% glycerol to be purified by column chromatography technique. The result showed that the crude glycerol was purified to 92.19%, which is much better than using vacuum filter. This glycerol with this purity can be readily used in cosmetic, soap, and lotion industry.