REFINADO DE LUBRICANTES MEDIANTE TECNOLOGÍAS EXTRACTIVAS DE BAJO IMPACTO AMBIENTAL

ALDANA PIZZANO; BELEN RODRIGUEZ REARTES; PABLO HEGEL

Buenos Aires

Congreso; Encuentro Argentino y Latinoamericano de Ingeniería 2021; 2021

Universidad de Buenos Aires

Manufacture ofspecial synthetic lubricants require a strict control of its composition andviscosity index, which made complex the operation of fractionation andpurifying units. In this work we study the refinement and purifying oflubricant oils by means of extraction technologies named as ?green?, due totheir low environmental impact. We propose the use of CO2 andpropane solvent mixtures to remove light components that are in lubricant oilsthrough liquid-liquid extraction, improving their composition of base. Asilicone oil is selected as a model lubricant for the studies to facilitate thethermodynamic analysis and operating condition studies that will be furtherperformed. In a high-pressure equilibrium cell, feasible operating conditionzones for extraction, i.e., of liquid-liquid-vapor equilibrium, are tested.Solvent mixtures of CO2 + propane are employed with concentrationsbetween 55 wt % and 94 wt % of CO2. The operating window of interestis between a temperature of 10 °C and 100 °C and a pressure of 40-85 bar.Equilibrium measurements show that concentrations of CO2 between 30wt % and 50 wt % in the solvent improve conditions of liquid-liquidfractionation in temperatures between 30 °C and 100 °C, with good solvent power(4.5 wt % to 6 wt % of silicone in the extract phase) to remove non-desiredminor components.