Abstract
This work investigates the non-catalyzed supercritical methanol (SCM) process for continuous biodiesel production. The lab-scale setup was designed and used for biodiesel production in the temperature range of 520–650 K and 83–380 bar with an oil-to-methanol molar ratio ranging from 1:5 to 1:45. The experiments were performed in the coiled plug flow tubular reactor. The volumetric flow rate of the methanol/oil ranged from 0.1-10 mL/min. This work examines a new reactor technology involving preheating and pre-mixing of the methanol/oil mixture to reduce setup cost and increase biodiesel yield under the same reaction conditions. Work performed showed that FAME’s yield increased rapidly with temperature and pressure above the methanol critical points (i.e., 513 K and 79.5 bar). The best methyl-ester yield using this reaction technology was 91% at 590 K temperature and 351 bars with an oil-to-methanol ratio of 39 and a 15-min residence time. Furthermore, the kinetics of the free catalyst transesterification process was studied in supercritical methanol under different reaction conditions.
Recommended Citation
A. A. Hassan and J. D. Smith, "Laboratory-Scale Research of Non-Catalyzed Supercritical Alcohol Process for Continuous Biodiesel Production," Catalysts, vol. 11, no. 4, MDPI, Apr 2021.
The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.3390/catal11040435
Department(s)
Chemical and Biochemical Engineering
Research Center/Lab(s)
Center for High Performance Computing Research
Keywords and Phrases
Biodiesel; Continuous flow reactor; Supercritical fluids; Transesterification
International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
2073-4344
Document Type
Article - Journal
Document Version
Final Version
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Rights
© 2021 The Authors, All rights reserved.
Creative Commons Licensing
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Publication Date
01 Apr 2021
