Synthesis of Value Added Product Processes from Residual Biomass

CASONI ANDRÉS IVAN; GUTIERREZ VICTORIA SOLEDAD; VOLPE MARÍA ALICIA; HOCH PATRICIA

Simposio; 13 INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON PROCESS SYSTEMS ENGINEERING; 2018

Residual biomass can be found in production processes or as an undesired component in the environment. As an example of the first, sunflower seed hulls are a residue from the oil industry, with thousands of tons a year, and as example of the latter, some types of algae present in water bodies. It is common practice to burn remnants of biomass in production processes as fuel for energy production, causing several environmental issues as the fumes and odor are very unpleasant. For this reason, there is a growing interest in using these biomass residues as feedstock for obtaining high value added products. For example, by pyrolysis of sunflower seed hulls, it is possible to obtain fuels from the bio-oil, bio char, syngas, and by separation from bio-oils, some other products as furfural (and then, by hydrogenation, furfuryl alcohol), among others. Two objectives are then met, solving an environmental issue and having added value products from otherwise a residue, with the benefit of having a free raw material. Several processes were developed at lab and bench scale by the research group, which allowed the characterization of the raw material as well as the possible products following different process paths, with different catalysts and process conditions. It is desirable to scale up these processes so as to provide a solution for the treatment of the growing amount of residual biomass, and having a profit out of it. In this work, the synthesis of a process for the production of sunflower seed hulls products will be presented at the conceptual stage. An MINLP problem is solved, with a superstructure generated by proposing different ways of treating the raw material, posing different alternatives for the process and desired products. The total cost of the process, the benefit and the Net Present Value are used as alternative objective functions. The solution of this problem allows for the identification of promising processes for the sensible and profitable use of residual biomass.