HIGH EFFIENCY BIODIESEL PLANT WITH MINIMUM GHG EMISSIONS FOR IMPROVED FAME PRODUCTION FROM VARIOUS RAW MATERIALS (ECODIESEL)

Framework: FP7 — Cooperation
Programme: Energy
Destination: Renewable fuel production
Action type: Collaborative project
Countries involved: Spain,Germany,Spain,Netherlands,Not available,Greece
Call:  (FP7-ENERGY-2007-2-TREN, 2007)
Start date: 2008-01-01
End date: 2011-12-31
Duration (months): 48.0
Total project cost (EUR): 8803853.0
EU funding (EUR): 4971572.0
Participants: 7
Project status: CLOSED

The project will demonstrate a 200.000 t/year capacity flexible FAME production plant, starting from different kinds of raw material oils, with the aim of reducing 40% of the CO2 balance compared to the well to wheel emissions of a conventional fossil diesel plant, through the following measures: • to develop an integrated transesterification process, linked to the neighbouring crushing process through pipeline connections for raw material and energy steam supply to the process, and creating a whole pipeline system for transport of all raw materials and final products, thus critically reducing transport costs and emissions, and boosting drastically the environmental performance of the plant in order to obtain higher energy and CO2 balances from the production process • to develop a Sustainability Due Diligence Model for Jatropha oil production, well above the current state of the art, able to be applied to the production of this biodiesel crop outside and inside the EU. The model will be applied to the study case of a Jatropha plantaion in Mexico. • to demonstrate Jatropha cultivation in Southern EU, and to research on the selection of the mewest species -plants/genotypes- best appropriate for biodiesel production. Attention will focus on analysing non-toxic/non carcinogenic versus toxic accessions including aspects of plant protection given the potential of multiple applications of the protein-rich by-products, such as animal feed and/or other valuable components. • to develop an online analyzer for Biodiesel characterization at industrial scale, based on the integration of state of the art detection systems and process reaction control software. This will give immediate quantitative results to assist in the manufacturing process of biodiesl, by confirming that the transesterification process has reached the percentage yield required • to research on the filtrability of biodiesel, in order to analyse the possiblity that some compounds may reduce the fluidity of the biofuel through the car engine filters or other narrow components The obtained biodiesel will fulfil the highest quality standard levels, and will include the novelty of an environmental calculation on CO2 emission savings, by means of life cycle analyses (LCA) obtained through the real project data. This is an industry-driven project. The consortium joins key players of the fuels and the biofuels sector of Spain (including an SME for innovative on-line process control system) and an industrial technology developer of Germany. Research centres are present with an specialist centre in crops analysis of the Netherlands and a national renewable energy centre for biomass LCA.

Keywords: biodiesel,energy efficiency,co2 saving,energy crops,biomass,crushing