Hybrid Membrane Systems in the Synthesis of Specialties Based on new Vegetable Oils

Abstract

The importance of natural, renewable resources is expected to grow rapidly. This is not only triggered by governmental rules to use environment-friendly products, like biodegradable lubricants, but also by increasing consumers markets for natural, healthy and environment-friendly products [1]. Natural feedstocks originating from, for instance, oil containing crops offer a number of possibilities to produce the desired products. For agriculture, which is continuously confronted with surpluses in Europe as well as in the USA, the possibility of supplying raw materials to the industry is very interesting. Especially a diversification by the introduction of new crops is considered as, at least, a part of the solution. Examples are the use of starch as a raw material for novel biodegradable plastics and vegetable oils that can be used for the production of biodegradable lubricants, cosmetic wax-esters and chiral building blocks. However, it has become clear that these new raw materials require innovative technology to eventually reach the required high value products. Furthermore, environment-friendly, energy non-intensive processes are necessary to maintain the benefits of using vegetable, renewable resources. Biotechnology, in combination with other unit operations like membrane separations, offers excellent opportunities to process the materials in the appropriate way. Since the reactions involved are seldomly characterized by 100% conversion into the desired product, an integration of biotechnology, especially enzymatic processing, and separation technology has to be applied.