ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE OF ACID AND ALKALINE CATALYST PROCESSES FOR BIODIESEL PRODUCTION FROM ANIMAL FAT

Abstract

Several processes have been proposed for biodiesel production, but the ultimate aim of any process is to be economically feasible. The quest to identify the most economically feasible process configuration for biodiesel production from animal fats suggest the use of simulation approach to obtain the necessary data at optimal operating parameters and specified feed and product specifications for economic assessment. Two processes configurations for biodiesel production from virgin and waste animal fat using acid and alkaline catalysts were identified and selected respectively. Acid and alkaline process configurations using both virgin and waste animal fat as feed were simulated to produce biodiesel with minimum purity of 99.9 % using Aspen Hysys version 7.2 at oil feed flow rates of 1.16 kmol/h and 1.19 kmol/h respectively. The raw materials requirement, product flow (desired and undesired), utility consumption and equipment sizes were evaluated from the simulation process. The result of economic analysis of alkaline transesterification of waste fat oil shows that the process has the highest total capital investment of $935 353.67 but yet is the most favoured with highest profit before tax resulting from its higher gross income and low cost of raw materials. Similar observation was made in the acid catalyzed process where the use of waste animal fat had the highest total capital investment of $1 995 507 and the most preferred option with highest net profit of $384 410. Among all the various processes investigated an alkaline process using waste animal fat is the most economical option for biodiesel production capable of handling industrial scale production.