Biodiesel plant

Biodiesel is environmentally-friendly and renewable fuel that can be produced from waste greases and oils from municipalities, restaurants and industry.

Environmentally-friendly and profitable biodiesel

Biodiesel plant produces environmentally-friendly and profitable biodiesel from animal and vegetable fats and waste oils. Biodiesel can be used blended with normal diesel as transport fuel. Biodiesel can also be used as heating oil or fuel for generators. The end products of the production process are biodiesel and valuable glycerol that is utilized in the chemical industry. When biodiesel is made from grease instead of virgin raw materials, it has significant environmental benefits.

Suitable raw materials for a biodiesel plant include:

  • used cooking oils from restaurants
  • waste oils and fats from the food industry
  • animal fats
  • oils from fish production
  • fat from grease traps and other low-grade fats mixed with water.
Environmentally-friendly and profitable biodiesel

Low costs

As the cost of biodiesel production is low and the demand for end products is high, the payback period of a biodiesel plant investment is typically short, usually 2-4 years. The plants are factory-built, so they are quick to install and start using. The minimum processing capacity for a profitable biodiesel project is typically 20 tons of feedstock per day. The capacity of a biodiesel plant can be scaled up.

Strong partner

Biovoima’s primary partner in biodiesel technologies is a US based company Renewable Energy Solutions (RPS), which has built over 20 reference biodiesel plants. The technologies developed and patented by RPS allow for the profitable utilization of challenging raw materials, which is usually a difficulty in traditional biodiesel production processes.

Advantages of RPS biodiesel technology

  • Modern, constantly developing technologies
  • Over 20 reference projects
  • Short payback period: typically 2-4 years
  • The end product meets the requirements of ASTM D6751 and EN 14214 and has a very wide market as a blend with fossil diesel
  • Easy to use, continuous, automated processes
  • Extensive raw material base
  • Suitable for decentralized biodiesel production
  • Accurate technology solution is chosen based on the quality of the raw material

Unique hybrid biodiesel technology

RPS has developed a unique hybrid biodiesel plant that combines traditional biodiesel production technology with a new-generation patented supercritical process. This provides significant benefits in situations where the aim is to deal with reasonably challenging feedstocks with a free fatty acid (FFA) content between 0 and 20 %. The hybrid process enables the separation and conversion of free fatty acids into biodiesel (methyl esters) in a supercritical process, whereby only good quality fats are introduced into the conventional catalyst process. In this case, there is no need to worry about the disadvantages of free fatty acids that disrupt the catalyst process, but on the contrary, they significantly increase the yield of biodiesel.

Hybrid biodiesel production process graph

Benefits of the hybrid biodiesel process:

  • Possibility to handle challenging feedstocks with FFA up to 20 %
  • Methanol consumption ¼th compared to acid esterification
  • Catalyst consumption ¼th compared to conventional process
  • Very high total biodiesel yield
  • Very good quality of end products (biodiesel and glycerol)
  • Lowest processing cost in the industry and thus excellent profitability.

Supercritical biodiesel process for challenging feedstocks

As part of the hybrid process, the supercritical biodiesel process is an excellent alternative when the levels of free fatty acids (FFA) are higher than 20 %. The process requires no acid or base catalyst, but the reaction with methanol takes place at high pressure / temperature, breaking the chemical bonds of the fatty acids and reacting with methanol. The end products are clean and require little post-treatment, making supercritical biodiesel process an outstanding technology.

RPS has built two of the world’s largest supercritical biodiesel production plants and owns technology-related patents.

Benefits of a supercritical biodiesel process

  • Process can handle feedstocks with FFA up to 100 %
  • In case of challenging feedstocks, the production costs are significantly lower than with the traditional process
  • No soaps, no salts and no side products formed during the process
  • Excellent quality of end products
  • Simple process, low maintenance costs