Abstract: Fossil fuel, especially crude oil and gas has dominated the global energy mix since World War II, and with it comes the challenges of global warming from greenhouse gases emissions, non-renewable and depleting resources, price hike of crude oil, and environmental pollution, all of which are key factors that have led to the quest for alternative energy sources. Some of the reliable alternative energy sources capable of replacing fuels include water, solar and wind energy, and biofuels, even though fossil fuel still constitutes about 86% of the total global energy consumed and close to a 100% utility in the transportation sector. In all these renewable sources, biodiesel has been identified as one of the most suitable replacement of fossil fuel in the transportation and power sectors. To achieve this energy transition, require efficient separation processes and techniques that will produce not only cost-effective fuels, but products that can also reduce the emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The paper noted that as environmental regulations become increasingly stringent, the costs associated with waste management are expected to rise, and therefore by reducing these costs, separation technologies can contribute to the competitiveness of any industrial economy. The paper further noted that less optimized separation processes are energy intensive coupled with creation of products that are hazardous to the environment and human health. Such systems are also very capital intensive and thus affect the redistribution of available resources to other growth sectors of the economy. This paper therefore reviewed the application of advanced separation techniques in biodiesel production and purification such as equilibrium based, affinity based, solid-liquid, and membrane based separation techniques, and noted that, the low energy intensive, but low quality membrane technology is preferred, and therefore has attracted further scientific and engineering investigation to improve its selectivity, throughput, capacity in order to provide the needed alternative systems to the high energy, high cost, but high quality distillation process, that currently handles fossil fuel used mostly in the transport system.
Keywords: Renewable Energy, Separation Processes and techniques, biofuel, membrane techniques, pollutants.
Title: APPLICATION OF ADVANCED SEPARATION TECHNIQUES IN BIODIESEL PRODUCTION AND PURIFICATION
Author: AMIEYEOFORI VALENTINE FELIX
International Journal of Electrical and Electronics Research
ISSN 2348-6988 (online)
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