Simulación de un proceso de producción de biodiesel a partir de aceite de palma mediante el software DWSIM

Abstract

The objective of this work was to design a simulation that includes the biodiesel production process from palm oil (Elaeis guineensis), for which the free license software DWSIM was used, since it is a specific simulator for chemical processes. The biodiesel synthesis plant was designed based on the transesterification reaction using ethanol (EtOH) so that the conversion occurs in the presence of sodium hydroxide (NaOH), in a conversion reactor under normal conditions, transforming tripalmitin in palmitic acid ethyl ester (PEt) and glycerol with a conversion percentage of 95%, to later take to a distillation tower where the PEt generated is separated from the non-reacting alcohol. This alcohol is reintegrated into process A, while the biodiesel rich bottom stream passes to an absorber together with a stream of water, separating the biodiesel from the glycerol and the remains of alcohol and catalyst, making it possible to obtain 99.11% highly pure biodiesel. The yield achieved is 87.29% of biodiesel production with respect to the oil and ethanol used. For the results validation, the calculation was used of the percentage error between the data obtained and the data reflected in the bibliography from high impact diffusion sources, achieving as a result a very low margin of error for the process that has been simulated. It can be concluded that the transesterification process is effective for the synthesis of biodiesel, so the simulated process can be replicated to build a full-scale plant. It is important to bear in mind that simple systems must be modeled in a dynamic state so that they can be easily solved, avoiding destabilization of the system by solving countless operations at the same time. It is important to keep in mind that simple systems must be modeled in a dynamic state so that they can be easily solved, avoiding destabilization of the system by solving countless operations at the same time.