Business GuidenessG BIOMASS BOILERS AND CHP PLANTS 90 kW – 15 MW Padova / Italy - www.uniconfort.com Increasing biodiesel yield using glycerol to methanol catalysis 36 Bioenergy International No 82, 6-2015 36 Bioenergy International No 82, 6-2015 ENABLING EMISSIONS COMPLIANCE WITH CYCLONES The new Agglomerator Cyclone (Hurricane MK) is the most efficient cyclone in the world and consistently reduces particulate emissions under 30mg/Nm3. Biomass Combustion and Biomass Drying www.acsystems.pt p e l l e t p l a n t s & c o m p o n e n t s » chipping dryer, air grader screening cleaning energy systems pelletizing www.dieffenbacher.com Canadian plans to impose new national base-level industrial emissions standards New research from the Cardiff Catalysis Institute (CCI) in Wales, UK has revealed a novel way of increasing the yield of biodiesel produced from oils and fats via the fatty acid methylesterification (FAME) process by using the crude glycerol by-product. Crude glycerol is often an undesired by-product as it is formed on a large scale and, depending on the initial feedstock, can contain many impurities making it costly to purify and re-use in other areas. By using simple catalysis the research highlights the ability to utilise the crude glycerol and convert it into methanol, a key FAME process ingredient to produce even more biodiesel. – We’ve provided unprecedented chemistry that highlights the potential to manufacture biodiesel in a much more environmentally friendly and potentially cheaper way, by converting an undesired by-product into a valuable chemical that can be reused in the process, said Professor Graham Hutchings, lead author of the study and Director of CCI. In the study, which has been published in the journal Nature Chemistry, CCI researchers developed a way of turning the crude glycerol back into methanol, which could then be used as a starting reactant to create more biodiesel. To achieve this, glycerol was reacted with water, to provide hydrogen, with a magnesium oxide (MgO) catalyst. The reaction involved a simple one-step process and could be performed using mild conditions. It is estimated that using the recycled methanol could increase the biodiesel yield by up to 10 percent without the need for additional inputs while potentially reducing the biodiesel production process. BI82/5030/AS
Bioenergy no 6 October 2015
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