Abstract
The use of biokerosene stands out for its potential to reduce environmental impacts on aviation’s use. One of the most promising and advanced routes for industrial use is the hydroprocessing of fatty acid esters (HEFA), and, although the biokerosene production is still more expensive than the conventional kerosene, many studies are focusing on process improvement and the development of catalysts with higher efficiencies. One possible approach to cost reduction of this route is the use of residual raw materials and one reactor, which can replace commonly used vegetable oils and reduce hydrogen consumption. In order to find better yields at lower costs, this work aims to simulate, optimize and verify the economic viability of the production of biojet fuel by HEFA route through a single-step process with reduction in hydrogen consumption, and using soybean acid oil as a residual raw material. The base simulation was developed using the Aspen Plus V10 software®, with literature data. Subsequently, different reactor conditions were tested, varying the hydrogen/oil ratio, pressure and temperature in the reactor to determine the optimal operating conditions to produce a high-quality biofuel. In addition, an energy integration analysis was carried out to reduce energy and utilities consumption, as well as CO2 emission analysis to verify environmental impacts for this route compared to fossil aviation kerosene. Finally, a preliminary economic analysis was performed, and an estimate of the investment required for the installation of a manufacturing unit was calculated.
