Journal Article

Preparation of Soap from Mixture of Palm Kernel Oil and Ashes of Unripe Plantain Peels

Abstract

Soaps are the sodium salts or potassium salts of fatty acids. They are produced by the saponification process, which is, reacting the oil which contain triglycerides with caustic soda to give the soap. However different oils have different composition of fatty acids which are responsible for different properties of soaps made out of them. In this work, Soap production and Analysis from palm kernel oil and plantain peel ash was carried out. The soap was prepared using palm kernel oil and plantain peels. The alkali was extracted from the plantain peels ash and used to saponify the oils for the production of soap. The saponification values, free fatty acid value and the Acid value of the palm kernel oil were analyzed and their value were found to be 218.12±0.65 mgKOH/g, 1.648±0.015 and 2.72±0.10 mgKOH/g respectively. One sample t-test analysis of the data obtained were conducted at 95% confident level using Minitab 17 statistical software. The results indicated that the p- values for saponification, free fatty acid and Acid value means obtained were 0.841, 0.591 and 0.522 respectively which were all greater than the alpha value (α = 0.05) confident level. The soap produced was analyzed by testing its moisture content and foaming stability and the result were found to be 7.86±0.46% and 3.52 ±0.12 minute respectively. The results indicated that the soap produced using palm kernel oil has very good properties, hence regarded as better soap and better cleaning agent for domestic and industrial purpose.

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