Catalytic Combustion of Bio-Diesel over Perovskite Catalyst

Heat energy sources are important not only for operating vehicles but also to warm up houses, cooking, and generate electricity from thermoelectric devices. Nowadays, the most world widely used heat energy source comes from burning fossil fuels which will run out in the near future. Therefore, finding a renewable energy source and combustion method, with high efficiency and reduced amount of harmful emissions, is necessary to protect our environment and thus lower the cost of energy. Biodiesel is a biofuel formed by a mixture of methyl esters with two or more oxygen atoms in their molecules, which makes easier to reach completed combustion, as compared with commercial diesel fuel. In addition, biodiesel can be synthesized from the biomass present in the waste of agricultural process, which reduces the costs of production as well as makes it an environmentally friendly process. Normal combustion of biodiesel occurs at very high temperatures (above 1500°C), and produces harmful pollutants such as nitrogen oxide, soot, and carbon monoxide due to uncompleted combustion. Expensive ruthenium-based materials have been used as catalysts for the combustion of biodiesel below 1,000°C. However, these noble-metal based materials are cost-prohibitive for commercial operations. In the present work, we have developed a lanthanum-manganese perovskite catalyst supported on yttrium-stabilized zirconia (LM-YSZ) as an inexpensive alternative to the aforementioned ruthenium-based catalysts and chemically stable in oxygen-rich environments. In the other hand, we tried lanthanum manganese oxide in different support such as titanium oxide. However, the experimental data obtained from our 24-h activity tests indicates that LM-YSZ shows a remarkable stability as well as a high carbon dioxide conversion than the lanthanum manganese catalyst in titanium oxide support where the oxygen carbon ratio is 1.6 compare with the stoichiometry ratio is 1.41. In addition, the mechanism of combustion in LM-YSZ is bi-function which means YSZ burn biodiesel and LM convert all carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide lead to completed combustion. Next, catalytic combustion in LM-YSZ is fuel flexibility which means it can burn completely not only biodiesel but also gasoline. Finally, Lanthanum Manganese oxide perovskite catalyst supported in YSZ showed high efficiently, cleanly and economically generate heat energy from catalytic combustion of biodiesel at the lower temperature.