Catalizador con metal soportado para la reducción selectiva de glicerol

FERRARI, L.; COMELLI, R.A

Santa Fe

Congreso; Congreso Internacional de Metalurgia y Materiales Sam-Conamet/Iberomat/Materia 2014; 2014

The rise of the biodiesel industry has brought with it an oversupply of glycerol, which is the byproduct of the process, generating a fall in its price. The transformation of glycerol into value-added compounds interest as it would improve the overall economic equation of biofuel production enabling environmentally sustainable development by using renewable raw material. The Province of Santa Fe has an installed capacity of 2.5 million TM/year of biodiesel, with consequent 250.000 TM/year of glycerol, so the topic is of great interest to the regional socio-productive means. One route is to valorize glycerol by catalytic hydrogenolysis reaction, better called selective reduction for propanediols. Metal supported catalysts were reported as assets to drive the liquid phase hydrogenolysis, finding little information for the gas phase reaction. For this reason, catalysts type Metal/Support were prepared by impregnation by incipient wetness, being evaluated in liquid phase in a system with stainless steel reactor and semicontinuous operation and also gas phase in a continuous system with fixed bed downflow reactor. The reaction was followed by gas chromatography, being on line to the non-condensed phase. The range of operating conditions evaluated was 170-240°C and pressures 1-30 kg/cm2. For liquid phase, levels of activity and selectivity to 1,2-propanediol achieved were similar to those reported by improving the conversion with increasing temperature and pressure. For gas phase conversion and selectivity were strongly influenced by the reaction conditions, the main co-product will be the acetol, indicated as reaction intermediate. The materials presenting better behavior were characterized by TPR, FTIR and XRD to determine their characteristics, relate the catalytic activity and optimize the preparation.