Abstract
Biodiesel demand increases steadily while using virgin oil as feedstock leads to food–energy competition. Application of conventional biodiesel process using waste cooking oil (WCO) as the alternative feedstock is limited due to the sensitivity of alkali catalysts to free fatty acids (FFA) and the need for glycerol and water washings. This work proposes and conceptually designs a catalytic membrane reactor process to overcome those mentioned limitations. Multiple components in the FFA and WCO were considered in the process design to better demonstrate practical situations and possible technical challenges. Its technical challenges and economic feasibility as well as sensitivities of key process parameters are also evaluated. Results show that the membrane reactor process has a high potential for commercial implementations and economically attractive because it avoids problems associated with the conventional process. Despite being the most sensitive parameter, FFA content of 30 wt% reduces the economic potential by only 5%, demonstrating the robustness of the developed CMR process. Better separation techniques and higher membrane selectivity toward biodiesel still need to be developed in the future to realize and improve the process.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Zabeti, M.; Wan Daud, W.M.A.; Aroua, M.K.: Activity of solid catalysts for biodiesel production: a review. Fuel Process. Technol. 90, 770–777 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2009.03.010
Keskin, A.; Gürü, M.; Altiparmak, D.; Aydin, K.: Using of cotton oil soapstock biodiesel-diesel fuel blends as an alternative diesel fuel. Renew. Energy 33, 553–557 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2007.03.025
Ramadhas, A.S.; Jayaraj, S.; Muraleedharan, C.: Use of vegetable oils as I.C. engine fuels–A review. Renew. Energy 29, 727–742 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2003.09.008
Brennan, L.; Owende, P.: Biofuels from microalgae–A review of technologies for production, processing, and extractions of biofuels and co-products. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 14, 557–577 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2009.10.009
Nurfitri, I.; Maniam, G.P.; Hindryawati, N.; Yusoff, M.M.; Ganesan, S.: Potential of feedstock and catalysts from waste in biodiesel preparation: A review. Energy Convers. Manag. 74, 395–402 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2013.04.042
Behzadi, S.; Farid, M.M.: Review: examining the use of different feedstock for the production of biodiesel. Asia Pac. J. Chem. Eng. 2, 480–486 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1002/apj.85
Wen, Z.; Yu, X.; Tu, S.-T.; Yan, J.; Dahlquist, E.: Biodiesel production from waste cooking oil catalyzed by TiO2-MgO mixed oxides. Bioresour. Technol. 101, 9570–9576 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2010.07.066
Lam, M.K.; Lee, K.T.; Mohamed, A.R.: Homogeneous, heterogeneous and enzymatic catalysis for transesterification of high free fatty acid oil (waste cooking oil) to biodiesel: a review. Biotechnol. Adv. 28, 500–518 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biotechadv.2010.03.002
Rahmanlar, I.; Yücel, S.; Özçimen, D.: The Production of methyl esters from waste frying oil by microwave method. Asia Pac. J. Chem. Eng. 7, 698–704 (2012)
Sharma, Y.C.; Agrawal, S.; Singh, B.; Frómeta, A.E.N.: Synthesis of economically viable biodiesel from waste frying oils (WFO). Can. J. Chem. Eng. 90, 483–488 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1002/cjce.20666
Zhang, Y.; Dubé, M.A.; McLean, D.D.; Kates, M.: Biodiesel production from waste cooking oil: 1. Process design and technological assessment. Bioresour. Technol. 89, 1–16 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1016/S0960-8524(03)00040-3
Farooq, M.; Ramli, A.; Subbarao, D.: Biodiesel production from waste cooking oil using bifunctional heterogeneous solid catalysts. J. Clean. Prod. 59, 131–140 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.06.015
Budžaki, S.; Miljić, G.; Sundaram, S.; Tišma, M.; Hessel, V.: Cost analysis of enzymatic biodiesel production in small-scaled packed-bed reactors. Appl. Energy. 210, 268–278 (2018)
Saleh, J.; Dubé, M.A.; Tremblay, A.Y.: Separation of glycerol from FAME using ceramic membranes. Fuel Process. Technol. 92, 1305–1310 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2011.02.005
Gomes, M.C.S.; Pereira, N.C.; de Barros, S.T.D.: Separation of biodiesel and glycerol using ceramic membranes. J. Membr. Sci. 352, 271–276 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2010.02.030
Alves, M.J.; Nascimento, S.M.; Pereira, I.G.; Martins, M.I.; Cardoso, V.L.; Reis, M.: Biodiesel purification using micro and ultrafiltration membranes. Renew. Energy. 58, 15–20 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2013.02.035
Atadashi, I.M.; Aroua, M.K.; Abdul Aziz, A.R.; Sulaiman, N.M.N.: Membrane biodiesel production and refining technology: A critical review. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 15, 5051–5062 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2011.07.051
Atadashi, I.M.; Aroua, M.K.; Abdul Aziz, A.R.; Sulaiman, N.M.N.: High quality biodiesel obtained through membrane technology. J. Membr. Sci. 421–422, 154–164 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.memsci.2012.07.006
Cao, P.; Dubé, M.A.; Tremblay, A.Y.: High-purity fatty acid methyl ester production from canola, soybean, palm, and yellow grease lipids by means of a membrane reactor. Biomass Bioenergy 32, 1028–1036 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biombioe.2008.01.020
Yaakob, Z.; Mohammad, M.; Alherbawi, M.; Alam, Z.; Sopian, K.: Overview of the production of biodiesel from Waste cooking oil. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 18, 184–193 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2012.10.016
Baroutian, S.; Aroua, M.K.; Raman, A.A.A.; Sulaiman, N.M.N.: A packed bed membrane reactor for production of biodiesel using activated carbon supported catalyst. Bioresour. Technol. 102, 1095–1102 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2010.08.076
Hasswa, R.; Dubé, M.A.; Tremblay, A.Y.: Distribution of soap in a membrane reactor in the production of fame from waste cooking oil. Can. J. Chem. Eng. 91, 459–465 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1002/cjce.21686
Alicieo, T.V.R.; Mendes, E.S.; Pereira, N.C.; Lima, O.C.M.: Membrane ultrafiltration of crude soybean oil. Desalination 148, 99–102 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1016/S0011-9164(02)00660-4
Morais, S.; Couto, S.; Martins, A.A.; Mata, T.M.: Designing eco-efficient biodiesel production processes from waste vegetable oils. In: Pierucci, S., Ferraris, G.B. (eds.) Computer Aided Chemical Engineering, pp. 253–258. Elsevier, New York (2010)
Kelloway, A.; Marvin, W.A.; Schmidt, L.D.; Daoutidis, P.: Process design and supply chain optimization of supercritical biodiesel synthesis from waste cooking oils. Chem. Eng. Res. Des. 91, 1456–1466 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cherd.2013.02.013
Lee, S.; Posarac, D.; Ellis, N.: Process simulation and economic analysis of biodiesel production processes using fresh and waste vegetable oil and supercritical methanol. Chem. Eng. Res. Des. 89, 2626–2642 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cherd.2011.05.011
Canakci, M.; Van Gerpen, J.: Biodiesel production from oils and fats with high free fatty acids. Trans. ASAE 44, 1429–1436 (2001)
Chai, M.; Tu, Q.; Lu, M.; Yang, Y.J.: Esterification pretreatment of free fatty acid in biodiesel production, from laboratory to industry. Fuel Process. Technol. 125, 106–113 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2014.03.025
Gerpen, J.V.: Biodiesel processing and production. Fuel Process. Technol. 86, 1097–1107 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2004.11.005
Abdurakhman, Y.B., Putra, Z.A., Bilad, M.R.: Process simulation and economic analysis of biodiesel production from waste cooking oil with membrane bioreactor. In: Proceeding of the International Conference on Applied Science and Technology 2017., Kedah (2017)
Komintarachat, C.; Chuepeng, S.: Solid Acid Catalyst for Biodiesel Production from Waste Used Cooking Oils. Ind. Eng. Chem. Res. 48, 9350–9353 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1021/ie901175d
Budiman Abdurakhman, Y.; Adi Putra, Z.; Bilad, M.R.; Md Nordin, N.A.H.; Wirzal, M.D.H.: Techno-economic analysis of biodiesel production process from waste cooking oil using catalytic membrane reactor and realistic feed composition. Chem. Eng. Res. Des. 134, 564–574 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cherd.2018.04.044
Budiman, Y.A.: Techno-economic evaluation of biodiesel production with membrane reactor (Undergraduate thesis), Universiti Teknologi Petronas (2017)
Suthar, K., Joshipura, M.: A comparative study on predictions of vapor liquid equilibrium of biodiesel systems. Presented at the Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Current Trends in Technology (NUiCONE’11) (2011)
Meng, X.; Chen, G.; Wang, Y.: Biodiesel production from waste cooking oil via alkali catalyst and its engine test. Fuel Process. Technol. 89, 851–857 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fuproc.2008.02.006
Haigh, K.F.; Vladisavljević, G.T.; Reynolds, J.C.; Nagy, Z.; Saha, B.: Kinetics of the pre-treatment of used cooking oil using Novozyme 435 for biodiesel production. Chem. Eng. Res. Des. 92, 713–719 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cherd.2014.01.006
Abdurakhman, Y.B.; Putra, Z.A.; Bilad, M.R.: Aspen HYSYS Simulation for Biodiesel Production from Waste Cooking Oil using Membrane Reactor. In: Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference. UPI Publication Center, Bandung (2016)
Aspen HYSYS v8. Aspentech (2015)
Javidialesaadi, A.; Raeissi, S.: Biodiesel Production from High Free Fatty Acid-Content Oils: Experimental Investigation of the Pretreatment Step. APCBEE Procedia. 5, 474–478 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apcbee.2013.05.080
The PubChem Project, https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
ChemicalBook—Chemical Search Engine, http://www.chemicalbook.com/
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Abdurakhman, Y.B., Putra, Z.A., Bilad, M.R. et al. Producing Biodiesel from Waste Cooking Oil with Catalytic Membrane Reactor: Process Design and Sensitivity Analysis. Arab J Sci Eng 43, 6261–6269 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13369-018-3474-x
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13369-018-3474-x