(576f) Thermo-Catalytic Conversion of Biomass Derived Lipids to Fuels and Chemicals over HZSM-5

In this study, thermo-catalytic cracking of triglyceride was carried out in a continuous pyrolysis system with feed injected through an atomizer. This allowed introduction of micron-sized droplets of oil that could be rapidly vaporized inside the hot reactor. With this novel design, we were able to achieve short vapor residence times (optimum Ï?_vap was 20s in order to achieve high liquid product yeilds and triglyceride conversion) without use of carrier gas, which would significantly reduce the overall cost of pyrolysis. Effects of reaction temperature (450<T_rxn<500 °C) and catalyst loading (HZSM-5; 0-5g) on conversion, product yields and composition were investigated. At T_rxn =500 °C and without catalyst, nearly quantitative conversion of feed was achieved and the yield of pyrolysis liquids was as high as 89% (relative to feed mass). Under these conditions, the identified products consisted of 37% hydrocarbons (C₅-C₁₇), 35% long-chain fatty acids (C₁₆-C₁₈, but primarily oleic acid) and 10% short-chain fatty acids (C₆-C₁₂). At T_rxn =500 °C using 5g of HZSM-5, the yield of liquid products was 65%. The identified liquid products contained 73% aromatics (C₆-C₁₂, but primarily benzene, toluene and xylene), 5% aliphatic and only 4% long-chain fatty acids. Overall, our results demonstrate the feasibility of producing liquid products at high yields, including a wide range of fuels (gasoline and jet) and enriched oleic acid (for oleochemicals production) with integration of conventional downstream separations, such as distillation.