Topic of thesis: Operation and Control of Enzymatic Biodiesel Production

Supervisors: John M Woodley, Jakob Kjøbsted Huusom and Mathias Nordblad

Starting Date: September 2011

Background: M.Sc. in Chemical and Biochemical Engineering from the Technical University of Denmark 

Price’s project is part of a wider initiative with Novozymes A/S and linked to the existing team of researchers at DTU, Århus University, Emmelev A/S and Novozymes A/S working on next-generation biodiesel processes. This work explores the control of biodiesel production via an enzymatic catalyst. Biodiesel is formed from the transesterification of oils/fats with an alcohol, using enzymatic catalysts to generate mono-alkyl esters (the basis of biodiesel) and glycerol as by-product. Currently enzymatic catalysts are not used in commercial-scale biodiesel production. This is mainly due to non-optimized process designs. Furthermore is it unclear what process variables need to be monitored and controlled to ensure optimal economics. Critical to the project is to develop a control methodology to optimize the productivity of biodiesel production.