Contribution to the production and use of biomass-derived solvents – a review

Débora Merediane Kochepkaa,Rafał M Łukasik,Douglas Henrique Fockink,Laís Pastre Dill

doi:10.32933/actainnovations.35.3

Abstract

In this review key processes for the synthesis of greener or more sustainable solvents derived from renewable sources (saccharides, lignocellulose and triglycerides) are discussed. It is shown that a series of platform chemicals such as glycerol, levulinic acid and furans can be converted into a variety of solvents through catalytic transformations that include hydrolysis, esterification, reduction and etherification reactions. It was also considered several aspects of each class of solvent regarding performance within the context of the reactions or extractions for which it is employed.

Highlights

In the last decades, there has been an increasing effort to reduce the use of petroleum-derived chemicals and fuels in order to decrease environmental pollution and to counteract global warming [1,2]
The use of greener solvents was investigated by other authors, such as Han et al [80] that converted cellulose into Levulinic acid (LA) using a solvent derived from biomass, γ-valerolactone (GVL), and the best result obtained was 35.6% of LA yield, at 185 °C in 120 min of reaction by using a lignin-based catalyst
Lomba et al [93] measured the vapor pressures of alkyl levulinates and the values obtained at 100 °C were 5.96, 4.69, and 1.56 kPa for methyl, ethyl and butyl levulinate, respectively. These results show their handle in relation to chlorinated solvents that present vapor pressures more than 400 kPa at the same temperature

Summary

Introduction

There has been an increasing effort to reduce the use of petroleum-derived chemicals and fuels in order to decrease environmental pollution and to counteract global warming [1,2]. The use of greener solvents was investigated by other authors, such as Han et al [80] that converted cellulose into LA using a solvent derived from biomass, γ-valerolactone (GVL), and the best result obtained was 35.6% of LA yield, at 185 °C in 120 min of reaction by using a lignin-based catalyst. The authors obtained 86.2% yield of GVL using only water as a reaction solvent in the LA hydrogenation This is very important because the commercial LA production via hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass is generally performed in water-contained medium that results in LA product streams containing water [110], which facilitates closer process integration and increasing efficiency, by removing the costly need to separate water from LA feeds prior to hydrogenation. Ni/HZSM-5 catalyst was much more effective to produce GVL, once it showed relative lower acidic sites and negligible GVL ringopening ability

Ru catalyst Acid condition

Findings

Conclusions