Evolution from biofuels to integrated biorefineries: techno-economic and environmental assessment of oil palm in Colombia

doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2014.06.021

Journal of Cleaner Production

Volume 81, 15 October 2014, Pages 51-59

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2014.06.021 Get rights and content

Highlights

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Analysis of Oil Palm biodiesel towards multiproduct biorefinery system.
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Modelling and simulation of four scenarios based on process configuration.
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Economic and environmental assessment to evaluate the most promising scenario.

Abstract

In this paper a techno-economic and environmental analysis for a biorefinery based on Oil palm is presented in non-bioenergy regions of Colombia as a case study. Different scenarios, based on process sequences, were modelled and assessed. This includes a standalone biodiesel plant, a biodiesel plant with mass integration, a multiproduct portfolio to produce biodiesel, ethanol, and poly-3-hydroxybutyrate, and the multiproduct portfolio plus mass integration. The configuration with the best economic and environmental performance was the multiproduct portfolio plus mass integration. For this case, the obtained economic margin was 64.5% (1.33 fold higher than standalone ethanol production), the potential environmental impact (PEI) was 156.42 PEI/t products and 0.51 t CO₂eq/m³ of biodiesel. On the other hand, the feedstock transportation was included to measure the influence on economics and carbon footprint indicator. For a travelled distance of 300 km the economic margin is decreased to 1.31%, and the carbon footprint increased up to 0.59 t CO₂eq/m³ of biodiesel for scenario 4.

Introduction

Palm is one of the most important oleo-chemical feedstock in Colombia. Currently, palm is used for biodiesel production and eight biodiesel plants are working. Biofuels such as biodiesel and bioethanol represent a renewable and convenient alternative for the substitution of fossil fuels, however, they cause concerns related to their economic and environmental viability. Implementing biorefineries as an additional process to current biofuel production processes is an interesting alternative to both overcome the limited profitability of these technologies and exploit the generated by-products (Moncada et al., 2013a, Santibañez-Aguilar et al., 2014, Tay and Ng, 2012). Therefore, the concept of biorefinery could be especially advantageous if the conversion of by-products or wastes into value-added products is included (Ekman and Börjesson, 2011, Ekman et al., 2013, Narodoslawsky et al., 2008).

Glycerol is the main by-product obtained from biodiesel, and it is usually produced in a weight ratio of 1:10 (glycerol/biodiesel) (Posada et al., 2012). The growing market of biodiesel has generated an oversupply on glycerol, increasing its production by 400% between the period of 2008–2010 (Posada et al., 2012). As a consequence, the commercial price of glycerol was ten-fold reduced during the same period of time. As a result of the low prices of glycerol, traditional producers such as Dow Chemical, and Procter and Gamble Chemicals, stopped its production (Posada et al., 2011, Posada et al., 2012). Since glycerol sales represent an important profitability for biodiesel industry, it is reasonable that low prices of glycerol could impact the economy of biodiesel producers negatively. Considering this, the correct exploitation of glycerol as raw material should be focused on its transformation into value-added products on a biorefinery concept (Posada et al., 2012). In this sense, the analysis of biorefineries based on glycerol able to co-produce value-added products is an excellent opportunity not only to raise the profitability of current biodiesel processes but also to produce other chemicals from a bio-based raw material.

On the other hand, the processing of palm for oil extraction leads to the formation of several by-products and residues that have an economical potential. The empty fruit bunches (EFB) is the solid residue with the highest production amount. Due to its high moisture content (approx. 68% (Quintero et al., 2013)), this material is not appropriate as a solid fuel, and therefore, it is mostly used as manure. Composting has been suggested as an option for producing high quality manure from EFB (Gutiérrez et al., 2009). On the other hand, the fibre resulting from separation of press cake (palm press fibre, PPF) has an important content of the lignocellulosic complex and a lower content of moisture. The oil retained in the fibre makes this material a good solid fuel. When palm-processing facilities produce both steam and electricity, the total amount of PPF undergoes combustion. However, if only steam is to be produced, 70% of PPF remains without utilization and becomes a waste. All solid palm residues containing lignocellulosics (EFB, PPF) can be potentially converted into different biofuels and chemicals (e.g. Ethanol and sugar derived products). It is considered that lignocellulosic biomass is the most promising feedstock at mid-term for ethanol production due to its availability and low cost (Gonela and Zhang, 2014, Mizsey and Racz, 2010, Quintero et al., 2013).

Considering this, biodiesel production from oil palm may have significant residue streams that can be transformed into value-added products in a cleaner way. The aim of this study is to analyse how a multiproduct biorefinery can be extended from a biofuel process using streams that can be valorised into added-value products. Therefore, this paper is focused on the production of biodiesel and its extension to a multiproduct biorefinery using streams with low added value generated during the biodiesel processes. These streams consist in Empty Fruit Bunches (EFB) resulted from the extraction of Palm Oil (used to produce bioethanol), and raw glycerol resulted from the process to produce biodiesel (used to produce Poly-3-hydroxybutyrate). These two processes were incorporated to a process producing biodiesel and it was analysed the effect of having a standalone biodiesel process, a mass integrated biodiesel process, a biorefinery configuration and a biorefinery configuration with mass integration. Each process alternative was assessed from the economic and environmental point of view. Additionally, it was analysed the effect of the transportation of the raw material (Oil Palm) over economics and environment.

Section snippets

Methodology

The methodology of the manuscript describes how biorefinery system was modelled, simulated and assessed. This section consists in a brief explanation of the processes of the biorefinery system, a brief description of the scenarios to be analysed, the procedure for the simulation, a description on the economic assessment and a description of the environmental assessment. These sub-sections are presented as follows.

Process simulation

Simulations of the four studied scenarios were used to generate their respective mass and energy balance sheets, which are the basic input for the techno-economic and environmental analysis. Table 2 shows the material balance for all the studied scenarios, and it can be seen that the production volume considers a processing capacity of 1 tonne per hour of crude oil to produce approximately 1 t/h of biodiesel. For the scenarios including EFB to produce fuel ethanol (Sc.3 and Sc.4), it can be

Conclusions

As an overview of the described process sequences, it is important to note that several configurations can be proposed and assessed for the use of Oil palm on a biorefinery concept. This sort of analysis serves as the basis draw recommendations for the efficient development and conceptual thinking of growing bio-based portfolios. In this specific case the behaviour of the environmental impact was inverse to the economic performance. Therefore, this demonstrates that both economic and

Acknowledgements

The authors express their gratitude to the Universidad Nacional de Colombia sede Manizales for funding this work.

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Evolution from biofuels to integrated biorefineries: techno-economic and environmental assessment of oil palm in Colombia

Highlights

Abstract

Introduction

Section snippets

Methodology

Process simulation

Conclusions

Acknowledgements

Comput. Chem. Eng.

Bioresour. Technol.

Chem. Eng. Res. Des.

J. Clean. Prod.

J. Clean. Prod.

J. Clean. Prod.

Bioresour. Technol.

Bioresour. Technol.

Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev.

Process Biochem.

J. Clean. Prod.

Bioresour. Technol.

J. Clean. Prod.

Process Biochem.

Bioresour. Technol.

J. Biotechnol.

Bioresour. Technol.