Stabilization of Pyrolysis Oil Obtained From Macro Algae Using Reactive Chromatography Technique

Abstract

The growing demand of carbon-emission free energy due to the ever-increasing climate changes and depletion in conventional fossil fuels calls for an alarming need for an alternative energy that not only meets the energy intensity of the conventional fuels but also reduces the harmful emissions, which in turn cause the climate changes. With this motive in mind, the past few decades have seen a considerable rise in the interests of developing bio-oil as an alternative to the present non-renewable sources of energy due to their extensive usage in this industrial age and for sustainable development of these resources for our future generation. Bio-Oil produced from the pyrolysis of the biomass (mainly wood, rice husk) contains a high amount of oxygenated organic compounds, and carboxylic acids resulting in the low calorific value of fuel and other inferior properties of the fuel. Bio-oil thereby requires be processing and stabilising in order to increase it’s potential to be used as an alternative fuel.The proposed technique thereby deals with the stabilization of biomass-pyrolyzed bio-oil using reactive chromatography on a continuous run. Basic principle involved is the esterification of the acids present within the bio-oil with suitable alcohols to increase the shelf life of bio-oil thereby increasing the stability. The novelty of the process lies in the fact that a batch run stabilization of the bio-oil has already been patented but no such technique has been developed for a continuous run and the catalyst used for the purpose has the potential to be reused hence an extremely economical technique for stabilizing the bio-oil.

Keywords: Bio-oil, Pyrolysis, oil stabilization