Transportation fuels vegetable oils

Development of Alternate Fuels for Transportation, Electrical Power Generation and various Industrial Processes (e.g., biodiesel from renewable sources such as vegetable oils). 

In Europe, vegetable-oil-based fuels are mainly produced from rapeseed. In the USA, vegetable-oil-based fuels are mainly derived from soybeans. Another feedstock used in Europe and North America is sunflower seed. Most of the vegetable oil that is used as energy source for the generation of transportation fuel is converted to fatty acid methyl ester (FAME), often called biodiesel . 

Biodiesel is a mixture of methyl esters of fatty acids and is produced from vegetable oils by transesterification with methanol (Fig. 10.1). For every three moles of methyl esters one mole of glycerol is produced as a by-product, which is roughly 10 wt.% of the total product. Transesterification is usually catalyzed with base catalysts but there are also processes with acid catalysts. The base catalysts are the hydroxides and alkoxides of alkaline and alkaline earth metals. The acid catalysts are hydrochloride, sulfuric or sulfonic acid. Some metal-based catalysts can also be exploited, such as titanium alcoholates or oxides of tin, magnesium and zinc. All these catalyst acts as homogeneous catalysts and need to be removed from the product [16, 17]. The advantages of biodiesel as fuel are transportability, heat content (80% of diesel fuel), ready availability and renewability. The... 

To date, the vegetable oils that have been seriously considered for use in highway transportation vehicles have been esters of vegetable oils mixed with diesel fuel in percentages of 20% or 30%. However, esters of vegetable oils themselves have very similar properties to diesel fuel, and there is no reason that they would be treated differently from diesel fuel in terms of building codes. 

First generation bioethanol and biodiesel production, which mainly makes use of cereal grains and vegetable oils, represents a growing source of high quantities of protein as a valuable by-product. Sanders et al. (2007) estimated that a 10% substitution of fossil transportation fuels worldwide by first generation biofuels would result in an annual production of 100 million tonnes of protein - about four times the proteins requirement of the world s human population. A direct result of this would be the saturation of traditional protein markets. New opportunities would therefore emerge for chemical production from proteins. 

Some of the renewable resources for the production of green energy are vegetable oils and animal fats. The use of neat lipids as transportation fuel has not been very successful due to their high viscosity which is leading to engine problems. The production of biodiesel (alkyl esters of fatty acids) is one of the best alternatives, and the blending of biodiesel with petroleum diesel is now widespread in Europe and in the U.S. 

Several developed countries have introduced policies encouraging use of biofuels made from grain, vegetable oil, or biomass to replace part of their fossil fuel use in transport. These initiatives generally have at... 

Bio-diesel, an alternative biofuel, is made from a vegetable oil that is extracted from the seeds of plants such as canola (rape plant), cotton, soybean and sunflower. This oil, which is used mostly in the manufacture of margarine, is reacted chemically with methanol to produce a methyl ester that can substitute satisfactorily for diesel fuel. Glycerol is produced as a by-product. Generally, up to 20 vol.% of bio-diesel is mixed with conventional diesel. Again, there is the problem of unfavourable economics. Bio-diesel is not yet fully cost competitive and the overall energetics of production, transport and consumption require careful evaluation. 

The environment in chemical tanks is amongst the severest to which marine coatings are subjected. Each tank may have to transport some 1500 bulk, liquid cargoes that include crude oil, refined gasoline, aviation spirit, diesel oil, solvents, vegetable oils, or wine. Inorganic cargoes are also carried in solution (e.g., alkalis and acids). New demands also appear such as methanol as a fuel and feedstock, and methyl rert-butyl ether as an additive for lead-free petrol. 

The most common application of vegetable oil-modified polyamides is in the surface coatings and paints industry. The dimer acids of tall and soybean oils and amines are used to modify the flow behaviour of paints. This thixotropic flow prevents setting and sagging, enables easy application and improves surface appearance. Vegetable oil-based nylons are used as engineering polymers in the automotive and transport industry for fuel lines. Products are also used for the extruded and moulded components of fuel systems such as filler necks, gas tanks, reservoir modules, filters, fuel rails and vapour recovery systems. Nylon 11 is also used in power coatings to coat metals that must withstand abrasion, impact and corrosion. 

Biodiesel is a renewable energy produced from sustainable animal fat and vegetable oil feedstocks, such as soy, rapeseed, sunflowers, palm oil, hemp, and algae, and can be used as a vehicle or transportation fuel. As with ethanol, however, biodiesel is more often used as a diesel additive to reduce the levels of pollution emitted by traditional diesel engines. It is primarily produced through a process known as transesterification, which is the exchange or conversion of an organic acid ester into another ester. 

Raw materials (apart from UVO) and auxiliaries used in transesterification process Transport includes the collection of used vegetable oil and fuel delivery... 

The urge to find sustainable replacements for transport fuel has led to a drive to find renewable, nontoxic, and carbon-neutral biofuels. Biodiesel is a fuel composed of mono-alkyl ester derived from vegetables oil or fats oil, which is proven to contribute to reductions in the world s dependence on fossil oils (Mumgesan et al., 2009). The most significant advantages of biodiesel usage over fossil fuel are ... 

BTL diesel is a renewable fuel of excellent quality, compared to both fossil-derived diesel and first-generation biodiesel produced via the transesterification of vegetable oils. BTL synthetic fuel consists mainly of linear paraffinic hydrocarbons with almost zero aromatics and sulfur compounds. The physical properties of BTL diesel presented in Table 18.6 (Rantanen et al., 2005) demonstrate its very high cetane number that can reach up to 75, much higher than conventional diesel. The big advantage of BTL diesel is that it is directly usable today in the transportation sector and furthermore it may be suitable for future fuel cell vehicles via on-board reforming since it is free of sulfur. 

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