Evaluation on the Large Scale Glycerol Production from Used Cooking Oil using SuperPro Designer Simulator

Glycerol constitutes a pivotal component within various industries, with a projected value of USD 12 billion by 2030. In response to the global paradigm shift towards zero-waste manufacturing, waste cooking oil has emerged as a sustainable and environmentally friendly feedstock for production of glycerol via enzymatic hydrolysis, offering environmental benefits compared to acid and alkali hydrolysis method, characterized by lower energy intensity, no organic solvent, and higher product qualities. Despite the current research limitations at the laboratory scale, hindered by scarce data for manufacturing processes, computational modeling and simulation stands as an invaluable tool, providing accurate predictive insights without incurring additional costs. This study employed SuperPro® Designer software package to assess glycerol production from enzyme hydrolysis using palm oil waste cooking oil (PWCO) and sunflower waste cooking oil (SWCO). The objectives are to identify suitable unit operations for both pre-treatment and downstream processing stages, in achieving 99.5% glycerol purity and to evaluate technoeconomic feasibility of producing 30 MT/year of glycerol. Simulation outcomes indicated that plate and frame filter press represents the optimal pre-treatment while combination of centrifugal extractor and distillation offers the most efficient downstream processing approaches, retaining high yield with minimized process costs. Notably, the technoeconomic viability of glycerol production from PWCO surpasses that of SWCO, attributed to lower capital cost and operating cost, higher return of investment (34.45%) and shorter payback period (2.90 years). In conclusion, the application of SuperPro software successfully quantifies the potential of waste cooking oil hydrolysis as a viable method for glycerol production.