Optimized separation strategies for butanol, IPA and ethanol fermentation broth

4^th International Conference on Bioprocess and Bio Therapeutics

October 20-21, 2016 Houston, USA

Daira Aragon, Franz Ehrenhauser and Peter Gaston

LSU Agricultural Center, USA

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Bioproces Biotechniq

Abstract :

Butanol is regaining importance in the area of biofuels and bio-based chemicals because of its characteristics as â�?�?drop-inâ�? fuel and its applicability as a solvent in diverse industries. One way to obtain bio-butanol is the isopropanol-butanol-ethanol (IBE) fermentation by Clostridium bacteria. The dilute solvent mixture (~10 g/L) contains mainly butanol (~64%) and isopropanol (~35%) and contains only very small quantities of ethanol (<1%). Both butanol and isopropanol are high-value products as industrial solvents and butanol (or butanol+isopropanol) could be used as â�?�?drop-inâ�? fuel. These components can be separated from the fermentation broth and purified using a combination of centrifugation, filtration, adsorption/desorption and distillation steps. In particular, desorption with steam occurs as a pulse, in which the majority of the mixture is obtained in a brief interval. Because distillation is an energyintensive process, it is important to determine if there is a point when desorption is no longer valuable and to find a configuration that maximizes recovery of each component. This work proposes a simulation model in Aspen Plus for the purification of butanol, isopropanol and ethanol, assuming the solvent mixture has been already recovered from the fermentation broth. Furthermore, different alternatives are simulated to determine the optimal distillation scheme, including recycle streams, for the separation of butanol, isopropanol and ethanol after the adsorption desorption steps.

Biography :

Email: daragon@agcenter.lsu.edu