Sustainable Pretreatment/Upgrading of High Free Fatty Acid Feedstocks for Biodiesel Production
Year: 2013
Type: article
Abstract: lower pH of 3.0-4.5.With proper increase of air flow rate along the flotation process, the recovery was consistently 90+% and could reach 98+% for samples of higher initial cell concentrations (> 1 × 10 8 cells/ml).As cells were responsible for foaming, the initial sample-to-column volume ratio should be lowered with increasing initial cell concentration (C o ), so as to balance the foam generation (good for high recovery) with draining (good for high concentrating ratio).We also investigated the potential of a process based on complexation of the FFA in oil with aqueous solutions of multivalent cations.When maintained at 70 º C for 4 -6 h, oil-water mixture successfully separated into two phases with an inter-phase below the oil layer.The complexed-FFA was largely moved into the inter-phase and the aqueous phase while the oil layer with reduced FFA could be separated.Using CaCl 2 as the complexing agent, the AV of the two selected oil samples in this study, having initial AV of 8.6 and 15.4 (mg KOH/g oil), were reduced to 3.2 ± 0.3 and 4.4 ± 0.2 (mg KOH/g oil) respectively.The FFA removal from oil would naturally lead to decrease (loss) of oil weight.The average oil loss (w/w) was 14 ± 1.4 % and 18 ± 2.2 % respectively, for the above two oil samples.When FeCl 3 was used for complexation, the AV was reduced to 4.8 ± 0.1 and 6.5 ± 0.34 (mg KOH/g oil), and the average oil loss (w/w) was 10 ± 2 % and 14 ± 3 % correspondingly.The study results support the possibility of an integrated process of (1) removing FFA by complexation, (2) treatment of the FFA-containing water with the phagotrophic alga, and (3) harvesting the oil-laden algal cells with air flotation, as a potentially economic and environment-friendly process to upgrade the high FFA WCO for biodiesel production.
Author: Majid Hosseini
Institution: University of Akron
Language: English
Subfield: Fuel Technology
Field: Energy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2566610028