Continuous Synthesis and in Situ Monitoring of Biodiesel Production in Different Microfluidic Devices

Currently, there is great interest in developing new processes for continuous biodiesel synthesis in order to overcome problems imposed by biphasic reaction and thermodynamic equilibrium, as well as to reduce production costs related to the conventional batch reaction processes. The use of microreactors can significantly improve the mixing between reactants and phases, enhancing the transfer rates, and, consequently, increasing biodiesel yields. Therefore, in this work, microreactors with different internal geometries have been fabricated and used for continuous production of biodiesel from castor oil and ethanol. The influences of the microchannel geometry (Tesla-, omega-, and T-shaped) on the performance of the biodiesel synthesis were experimentally studied. Higher biodiesel yields were reached using the Tesla- and omega-shaped microchannels than during the T-shaped microchannels due to better mixture mechanism efficiency. Using a catalyst loading of 1.0 wt % NaOH and a reaction temperature of 50 degrees C, ethyl ester conversions of 96.7, 95.3, and 93.5% were achieved using Tesla-, omega-, and T-shaped microreactors, respectively. In addition, transesterification reaction in situ monitoring by near-infrared spectroscopy using a fiber-optic probe was evaluated, showing that more studies must be performed in order to allow its use in online monitoring of continuous processes.