Design and economic analysis of the technological scheme for 1,3-propanediol production from raw glycerol

A technological scheme for producing 1,3-propanediol from raw glycerol was designed, simulated, and economically assessed. The production process was composed of three main stages, namely: glycerol purification, glycerol fermentation, and 1,3-propanediol recovery and purification. First, a typical stream of raw glycerol was purified up to 98 wt %, and then the fermentation took place in a two continuous stages process by means of a Klebsiella pneumoniae strain. For the fermentation stage, a rigorous analysis was carried out using a kinetic model considering both substrate and products inhibition. Thus, multiplicity of steady states and hysteresis loops were studied for the first fermentation stage. Also, in order to optimize both the outlet concentration of 1,3-propanediol and its productivity, three different objective functions were analyzed. As result, each objective function led to an optimal condition, such as: the highest global yield to 1,3-propanediol (0.599 mol/mol), the highest outlet concentration of 1,3-propanediol (0.512 mol/L), and the highest global productivity (1.157 x 10(-2)), respectively. Then, the downstream process for 1,3-propanediol recovery and purification was designed based on a reactive-extraction process and a reactive-distillation process. This downstream process was applied to each scenario analyzed on the fermentation stage. Finally, the three scenarios were economically assessed and the lowest production cost was obtained for the third scenario. Simulation process and fermentation analysis were performed using Aspen Plus and MatLab respectively, while the economic assessment was carried out using the Aspen Icarus Process Evaluator.