Effect of Temperature on Plasma-Assisted Catalytic Cracking of Palm Oil into Biofuels

I Istadi,Theobroma Guntur Muhamad,Didi Dwi Anggoro,Teguh Riyanto,Luqman Buchori,Roni Ade Saputra

doi:10.14710/ijred.9.1.107-112

I Istadi, Theobroma Guntur Muhamad + Show 4 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.14710/ijred.9.1.107-112

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Abstract

Plasma-assisted catalytic cracking is an attractive method for producing biofuels from vegetable oil. This paper studied the effect of reactor temperature on the performance of plasma-assisted catalytic cracking of palm oil into biofuels. The cracking process was conducted in a Dielectric Barrier Discharge (DBD)-type plasma reactor with the presence of spent RFCC catalyst. The reactor temperature was varied at 400, 450, and 500 ºC. The liquid fuel product was analyzed using a gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) to determine the compositions. Result showed that the presenceof plasma and catalytic role can enhance the reactor performance so that the selectivity of the short-chain hydrocarbon produced increases. The selectivity of gasoline, kerosene, and diesel range fuels over the plasma-catalytic reactor were 16.43%, 52.74% and 21.25%, respectively, while the selectivity of gasoline, kerosene and diesel range fuels over a conventional fixed bed reactor was 12.07%, 39.07%, and 45.11%, respectively. The increasing reactor temperature led to enhanced catalytic role of cracking reaction,particularly directing the reaction to the shorter hydrocarbon range. The reactor temperature dependence on the liquid product components distribution over the plasma-catalytic reactor was also studied. The aromatic and oxygenated compounds increased with the reactor temperature.©2020. CBIORE-IJRED. All rights reserved

Highlights

Energy demand increases as economic growth, population growth, energy cost, and government policy
In order to compare between performance of plasmaassisted reactor and conventional fixed bed reactor for palm oil cracking, the cracking process was conducted at 450 oC in the presence of the spent residue fluid catalytic cracking (RFCC) catalyst
The plasma has role on improving selectivity towards shorter-chain hydrocarbons product due to assisting the cracking reaction on the catalyst surface. This shows that plasma influences reactions through collisions of high energetic electrons and the electrons pair on covalent bonds of reactant molecules of hydrocarbons or triglyceride (Istadi et al, 2019; Meeprasertsagool et al, 2017; Wu et al, 2015; Hao et al, 2015; Istadi and Amin, 2006)

Summary

Introduction

Energy demand increases as economic growth, population growth, energy cost, and government policy. In line with the increase in national energy demand, petroleum demand is expected to increase. Petroleum reserves are depleting, because it is a nonrenewable/limited energy resource. Renewable alternative energy is needed to supply energy demands. One alternative energy, which is potential to be developed, is biofuel. The biofuel is a renewable energy, because it is produced from biomass through chemical conversion. Some of biofuel advantages are easy to adapt to other fuels, biodegradable, and environmentally friendly (Thanh et al, 2012). Its combustion produces better emissions compared to fossil fuels (Pattanaik and Misra, 2017), because it does not contain any pollutant compounds, such as: sulfur and nitrogen (Ramya et al, 2012)

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