Oct 12 2009
Yellow Diesel B.V. succeeded in producing high-quality biodiesel in a continuous fixed-bed micro plant based on heterogeneous catalysis. This process gives pure biodiesel plus a cosmetics/food grade glycerol, with practically no waste streams. The biodiesel specifications are better than required by the European norm EN14214.
The Yellow Diesel process eliminates all the aqueous waste streams that stem from using the conventional homogeneous acid/base catalyst technology. Thanks to the novel catalyst and integrated process design, the process saves up to 40% of the capital costs and 30% of the operating costs compared to a conventional plant. Yellow Diesel has produced the biodiesel in its continuous micro plant, and is now scaling up the process to pilot-scale. Importantly, this process can be adjusted to various types of feedstock, including low-quality oils, waste oils and fats.
The following sample shows the quality specifications of the biodiesel made from industrial-grade rapeseed oil, as determined by the independent laboratory NofaLab.
| Analysis results |
YellowDiesel |
EN14214 |
| Ester content |
99.5% |
>96.5% |
| Density at 15ºC |
0.8740 |
0.860–0.900 |
| Flash point |
>120 ºC |
>120 ºC |
| Methanol content |
0.02% |
<0.2% |
| Monoglyceride |
0.57% |
<0.8% |
| Diglyceride |
0.19% |
<0.2% |
| Triglyceride |
0.15% |
<0.2% |
Yellow Diesel B.V. is a spin-off company of the UvA Holding B.V., the holding company of the University of Amsterdam.