From glycerol to value-added products

Angewandte Chemie - International Edition

Volumn 46, Issue 24, 2007, Pages 4434-4440

  Pagliaro, Mario ^a   Ciriminna, Rosaria ^a   Kimura, Hiroshi ^c   Rossi, Michele ^b   Della Pina, Cristina ^b  

^a CNR   (Italy)

^b UNIVERSITY OF MILAN   (Italy)

^c Kokura Synthetic Industries Ltd   (Japan)

Author keywords

Biofuels; Biomass; Glycerol; Oxidation

Indexed keywords

BIOFUELS; BIOMASS; CHEMICAL INDUSTRY; INDUSTRIAL PLANTS; OXIDATION; RAW MATERIALS;

FUNCTIONAL DERIVATIVES; LOW-COST FEEDSTOCK; SURPLUS; VALUE-ADDED PRODUCTS;

GLYCEROL;

GLYCEROL;

CHEMISTRY; ECOSYSTEM RESTORATION; INDUSTRIAL WASTE; SHORT SURVEY;

ENVIRONMENTAL REMEDIATION; GLYCEROL; INDUSTRIAL WASTE;

EID: 34250753237     PISSN: 14337851     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1002/anie.200604694     Document Type: Short Survey

References (44)

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2. See the recent report from Frost & Sullivan: "R&D Creating New Avenues for Glycerol" (August 4,2006), available online at https://www.frost.com/prod/servlet/market-insight-top.pag?docid=77264824.
3. The US agribusiness company Archer Daniels Midland recently announced plans to make propylene glycol from glycerol instead of propylene oxide. Dow Chemical closed its glycerol plant in Texas early this year when Procter & Gamble Chemicals shut down a natural glycerol refinery in England. See: a) M. McCoy, Chem. Eng. News 2006, 84(6), 7;
4. b) M. McCoy, Chem. Eng. News 2006, 84(2), 32.
5. As of July 2006, pure glycerol was sold at 600-800 €/ton while crude glycerol of high quality obtained by biodiesel production was sold at 600-700 €/ton with glycerol currently priced at around 850 USD/ton. At prices approaching 770 USD/ton, glycerol becomes a significant platform chemical. If, as anticipated, biodiesel production grows to 3.23 million tons worldwide, an extra 323000 tons of glycerol would reach the market thus rendering glycerol a readily available commodity.
6. Biodiesel yields a net energy balance ratio of 1.93 (i.e. 93 % more energy produced than the energy invested in its production, whereas ethanol yields only 25% more energy): J. Hill, E. Nelson, D. Tilman, S. Polasky, D. Tiffany, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 2006, 103, 11206.
7. Crude glycerol from biodiesel production is an excellent additive for concrete, enhancing its resistance to compression and grinding and lowering its setting time. Mechanical tests carried out on "clinker" (the cement precursor which is mixed with gypsum to yield the concrete) samples doped with crude glycerol show, in all cases, that raw glycerol imparts better mechanical and chemical properties compared to those samples doped with commercial additives, including pure glycerol. Tests on an industrial scale using trucks of crude glycerol confirmed the results on the laboratory scale, and commercialization of cement added with biodiesel glycerol started in late 2006. M. Rossi, M. Pagliaro, R. Ciriminna, C. Della Pina, W. Kesber, WO2006051574, 2004.
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28. By the Netherlands-based consortium Procedé Group bv, with the involvement of industrial partners. According to an EU directive, by the year 2010 5.75% of the total amount of fuel consumed in the EU should originate from renewable sources. In Germany alone, this would mean 30 million tons, equivalent to 3 million tons of glycerol or to 10 millions tons of GTBE (a likely antidetonant). If realized, it could be easily absorbed by the market, as large amounts of TBE are already available on the market as it used as the starting material of MTBE still in the EU (but it is banned in California and 19 other US states).
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43. Small-scale production of these highly branched glycidol polymers has been commercialized in Europe by Hyperpolymers (Germany).
44. Solvay is building a facility utilizing this new process which should be operative in the first half of 2007, with the required glycerol supplied from the biodiesel producer Diester Industrie.