Publication: Catalyst testing for renewable fuels and chemicals

Authors: Giada Innocenti, Kai Dannenbauer, Jochen Berg, Xavier Sanz and Ioan-Teodor Trotus hte GmbH

ptq, Q4 2023

Worldwide sustainability goals are calling for a major redesign of the petrochemical and chemical industries. The net-zero CO₂ emission goals set for the next decade require such industries to improve their efficiency and start relying on different raw materials. Selected resources need to be either renewable, such as vegetable oils, animal fats, and sugars, or recycled, such as pyrolysis oil or used cooking oil. Additionally, they need to be widely available and not food competitive. Food competition makes using most of the feedstocks that are well-characterised and commercially ready (vegetable oils) challenging in the long term. Thus, the need to test feedstocks deemed more challenging, such as pyrolysis oil, will become very relevant soon. The use of such feedstocks will also perfectly match the concepts of a circular economy that aim to use the wastes of one industry as feedstocks for another. However, such types of feedstocks are currently not close to commercial implementation and require additional developmental work.

In this article published by Digital Refining / PTQ, hte GmbH presents you the possibilities and best practises to run renewable feedstocks in high throughput units.