ABSTRACT

Commissioning of a Microalgae Cultivation & Harvesting Pilot Plant and Development of a Feasibility Analysis Tool

IREC closured two projects with Repsol and Gas Natural Fenosa (energy global companies interested in microalgae feedstock) involving:

• Commissioning of a 3400 m²outdoor pilot plant, with a culture capacity of 53 m³ in semiclosed photobioreactors.
• Microalgae concentration by means of sedimentation and dynamic filtration. Cell disruption and lipid pre-extraction by means of steam explosion.
• Development of a computing tool to perform mass & energy balances, dimensioning and economic analysis.

Dynamic filtration and steam explosion were tested. An important improvement in performance was achieved with dynamic filtration, which lets decrease cost. Steam explosion successful broke microalgae cells as well as performed sample pre-fractionation, which improves lipid extraction reference performances.

A computing tool was developed to evaluate a variety of process scenarios. After fixing input variables, it performs mass and energy balances, plant dimensioning, general economic analysis and sensitivity reports.

Carles TORRAS
Fund.Inst.Recerca Energia Catalunya, SPAIN

Dr. Carles Torras holds a research position at Catalonia Institute for Energy Research (Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain). His research interests & background are membrane technology, microalgae biorefining, CFD, microfluidics & software development.

Co-Authors:

C. Nurra
E. Clavero
E. Lorente
J. Salvado