Laboratory Experiments to Optimize a Packed Bed Reactor for the Production of Chemical Products From Sustainable, Waste Crude Glycerol

The process for the production of biodiesel from vegetable oils yields large quantity of crude waste glycerol as a by-product. The glycerol by-product has the effect of reducing the overall carbon utilization of the biodiesel process. However, if the crude glycerol produced could be used to create an industrially important yet sustainable product the carbon utilization as well as the overall process economics of the biodiesel could be improved.

It is well known that a range of chemical products can be produced from crude glycerol. Based on established literature data, a bench scale reactor was designed and built to produce an array of C3 compounds from waste crude glycerol. The reactor has the ability to produce a variety of C3 compounds, such as acrolein, 1,2-propanediol, 1,3-propanediol, hydroxyacetone, and acrylic acid. The purpose of this research is to conduct a series of experiments to determine the optimum operating conditions for this reactor. Optimization parameters include: flowrate, composition, temperature and catalyst concentration. Additional experiments to develop a procedure to regenerate the catalyst in place are also included.

The laboratory results generated from this project will be used to provide input for a computer simulation of an industrial scale glycerol dehydration process including the waste and recycle streams and all separation processes necessary to yield a marketable product. Using the computer simulation, a cost effective set of parameters will be determined and the results will be tested using the laboratory small scale reactor for comparison.