The acid/base catalysis used for biofuel production looks like 1940's chemistry - 55 gallon drums, KOH, etc. The polymer industry, specifically polymer polyols to make urethanes used this type of chemistry. I know this because I worked at one of the top urethane suppliers R&D process development group in the mid 90's. We were reacting ethylene oxide and propylene oxide to make polymer polyols, similar Sn2 chemistry. Instead of using KOH as a catalyst we were working towards using a tetracyanocobaltate compound as a catalyst. The polymer polyol had to be cleaned of any K+ after reacting because it would kill the next step, so a resin (Magnasol, as I remember) was used to clean it out. The magnasol was landfilled after use. The process using the tetracyanocobaltate compound eliminated the need to remove K+, so nothing was dumped in the landfill. It was all going well, and the company started ramping up a continuous process, winning contracts and making more money, then Lyondell bought our division and Bayer a short time after. To make a long story short, I don't think the catalyst is being used - lost in the buyouts. When Bayer bought us out all our PC's were sent to germany and replaced with much older pc's, and our equipment went as well. Then everybody was let go as Bayer screwed up our contracts with 3M, ford, toyota, etc. Amazing how quickly a 6 billion annual business can be ruined by bean counters. Is anyone on the list looking into post-WW II chemistry as a method for producing biofuels? I found one article on xeolites, but that was it. A lot of money is being spent on scaling the reaction up, but I don't see too much development being done on a better method. I think the kinetic studies are a good place to start. Enzymes look promising, but not a real solution for the 3rd world. I read an article on supercritical production without using a catalyst. Not too promising as hastaloid is super expensive and the reaction didn't behave too much better, still needed alot of heat. There has been alot of money spent on polymer catalysts, perhaps one of these could be used in biofuel production.
Just a thought. --Mike ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark Printer at MyInks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada. http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511 http://us.click.yahoo.com/mOAaAA/3exGAA/qnsNAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuels list archives: http://archive.nnytech.net/index.php?list=biofuel Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
