Caracterização e Utilização de Óleo Residual de Pequi (Caryocar brasiliense) na Produção de Biocombustíveis Líquidos.

Abstract

Biodiesel is the biofuel most used by many countries because it is a renewable source, biodegradable and based on a tripod: environment, social and energy. Thus, some industries are conducting internal programs to recycle their waste to reduce operating expenses, generate a new by-product for the industry, and control pollution. The Cerrado Emporium Association collects 30-50 ton./year of pequi fruit. (Caryocar brasiliense), being its main byproduct the pequi stone which has no industrial application and to increase the competitiveness of this byproduct was studied the production of liquid biofuels through two routes: esterification reaction and cracking / pyrolysis based on its composition. That is, it presented 92.29% of unsaturated fatty acids and 7.71% represented saturated fatty acids, besides the acidity index (12.2 mg KOH / g) oil and saponification (391.78 g. oleic acid (100g) -1). Thus, the esterification reaction was performed, obtaining a conversion value of 91% and in order to eliminate the described problems of traditional basic homogeneous catalysis. In cracking, 4% (w/w) of heterogeneous catalyst was used, such as: CeO2, CoO, NiO and HUSY zeolite. The obtained products were submitted to acidity index, GC/MS, IR, mass efficiency and CHNO elemental analysis. The CoO and NiO catalysts presented the highest mass yield and CoO showed the highest acidity reduction, being therefore the best option among the studied options.