Details

Title:

Biofuels from Microalgae: Suitability of Strains for Hydrothermal Liquefaction

Author(s):

López Barreiro, D., Torri, C., Ronsse, F., Prins, W., Fabbri, D., Brilman, W.

Document(s):

Abstract:

Among the different types of biomass, microalgae have the potential of becoming an important energy source in the future, and hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) appears as a promising technology for that purpose. It produces an organic liquid energy carrier, usually called biocrude oil, together with gas, aqueous and solid phases. The complex phenomena occurring during the process, as well as the influence of the type of microalgae, are not fully understood. This work aimed to study how different strain­specific parameters (i.e. biochemical composition, cell structure or growth medium) affect the HTL biocrude oil production, in order to suggest the best strains for this process. Most of the studies available on microalgae HTL have reported just a phenomenological description of the biocrude yields obtained. In this work, deeper studies were carried out, focusing on its composition. For that reason, stepwise Py­GC/MS was coupled with Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), allowing to characterize a large fraction of the biocrude oil.

Keywords:

liquefaction, microalgae, thermochemical conversion, liquid biofuel, oil characterization

Topic:

R&D on Processes for Solid, Liquid and Gaseous Fuels from Biomass

Subtopic:

Oil-based biofuels

Event:

21st European Biomass Conference and Exhibition

Session:

3CO.8.4

Pages:

1318 - 1322

ISBN:

978-88-89407-53-0

Paper DOI:

10.5071/21stEUBCE2013-3CO.8.4

Price:

FREE