Sustainable biodiesel production through an integrated perspective

NANCY BÁLSAMO; MÓNICA CRIVELLO; GABRIEL FERRERO; GRISELDA EIMER

Conferencia; 2nd RCN Conference on Pan American Biofuels & Bioenergy Sustainability; 2016

Biofuels arerenewable solutions to replace the environmentally pollutant fossil liquidfuels. They are produced from low cost sustainable feedstocks. In the la lastyears, biodiesel production had increased exponentially. This is generatinghigh quantities of glycerol as by-product. Significant economic benefits to theindustry of biodiesel, is to research in a green processes through enzymeimmobilized and to add value of a byproduct generated in abundance, theglycerol. One of theobjective of this work is to develop a catalyst for its use in the biofuelsproduction from renewable raw materials using an enzymatic immobilization onsolid supports nano-structured. In fact, the main purpose is to immobilize thelipase of Pseudomonas fluorescens in the mesoporous material SBA-15 (SantaBarbara Amorphous) pure, synthesized by hydrothermal treatment. Inaddition, by comparing their activity for the biodiesel production, fromvegetable oils, with the enzyme immobilized on materials SBA-15 modified withmetals (Ca, Na, Fe, Cu, Al, K) by the wet impregnation method. Thephysicochemical properties of the synthesized mesoporous materials weredetermined by Small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS), Transmission electronmicroscopy (TEM) and UV-visible. The enzyme was immobilized by mixing eachmesoporous material with an enzyme solution to achieve immobilization byphysical adsorption. The effective incorporation of the enzyme in the materialswas confirmed determining the amount of protein in the soluble fractionafter immobilization by the Bradford method. The optimal conditions for thecatalytic activity of the biocatalyst were determined: oil / ethanol ratio,%water, amount of immobilized enzyme / mg of SBA-15 materials, reaction time andactivity of the biocatalyst respect to the metal impregnated in the solid used. Simultaneously,glycerol value-added products such as monoglycerides were produced viatransesterification reaction of methyl stearate. Monoglycerides derived fromglycerol are compounds employed as emulsifiers in food, cosmetic andpharmaceutical products. This green and selective process involved catalysisfrom hydrotalcite-like compounds.  Nano-structuredmaterials from layered double hydroxides are industrially used in heterogeneouscatalysis processes. They offer great advantages compared to homogeneouscatalysis, since not only favors the environment, but also allows the use ofseparation operations less complex.The proposal is touse derivatives nano-clays mixed metal oxides with different metalsincorporated (Li, K or Cs) to improve their basic properties. The presence ofmetal ions, hydroxyl groups on the surfaces of the sheets and anionsinterchangeable makes them ideal compounds for preparing functionalizationproducts allowing the design of new nanoscale materials. The materials physicochemicalproperties were characterized. The correlation between their properties and thecatalytic activity in the transesterification reaction was investigated. Thehighest activity was found for the catalyst with Li incorporated by theco-precipitation method with yield values around 80% for monoglycerides. Thecatalyst with Li incorporated also showed the greatest Lewis medium basic sitesdensity, a 31% more than the rest of the materials.The production ofbiodiesel and the revalorization of glycerol to minimized costs, throughselective heterogeneous catalytic way, which encourages the use of energy andrenewable raw materials with less environmental cost, shows the road tosustainability.