Environmental impact analysis of methanol recovery in biodiesel production using the waste reduction algorithm WAR

Abstract

The environmental impact of recovering methanol in the traditional process of biodiesel production is presented. Biodiesel represents an alternative for diminishing impact on the environment. However, there are several biodiesel production processes and all of them have different impact on the environment. The methodology consists of simulating the process, apply the WAR algorithm for waste reduction and compare the results. Comparison is also done with literature data for similar cases. The analysis shows that methanol recovery transforms the conventional process of biodiesel production into an environmental friendly process.