Aqueous Phase Reforming of Glycerol for Value Added Chemicals Production over Ni-Based Catalyst

The use of biomass as renewable resources to replace the fossil fuels is essential for the sustainable development of our society. However, the world biodiesel production has increase slowly due to high production cost. Glycerol is one of the by-products of transesterification of fatty acids for the production of biodiesel. Catalytic conversion of glycerol can be used for production of value-added chemicals such as liquid chemicals, wood stabilizers and hydrogen. These products can improve the economics of the biodiesel production process. Hence, glycerol has become an important feedstock for value-added chemicals production. Aqueous Phase Reforming (APR) of glycerol is found to be one of the effective way to produce value-added chemical production.
Aqueous Phase Reforming (APR) is a reforming reaction occurring in the presence of excess liquid water. The objective of this experiment is to study the optimal
conditions for maximizing the production of value-added chemicals using APR of glycerol. The experiment is conducted by varying the operating parameters, operating temperature, operating pressure and concentration of glycerol. The effectiveness of the reaction is determined by the final chemical composition of the liquid and gas mixture after going through different operating parameters. The overall APR performance strongly correlates with temperature, pressure and glycerol’s concentration. For the experimental results, a maximum glycerol conversion of 95.11% was achieved at the operating conditions of 200oc, 10 bar and 100% of glycerol concentration. Hexane was found to have significant amount of composition in the reforming products which is 18.59%. For the simulation results, in the presence of gas, the formation of Methane is increase as the operating temperature is increase. The formation of Methane is increase as the operating pressure is increase. The formation of Methane is increase as the glycerol’s concentration is increase. In the absence of gas, the formation of Propanoic Acid is increase as the operating temperature is increase. The formation of Propanoic Acid is increase as the operating pressure is increase. The formation of Propanoic Acid is increase as the glycerol’s concentration is increase.