An overview of biomass thermochemical conversion technologies in Malaysia.

The rising pressure on both cleaner production and sustainable development have been the main driving force that pushes mankind to seek for alternative greener and sustainable feedstocks for chemical and energy production. The biomass 'waste-to-wealth' concept which convert low value biomass into value-added products which contain high economic potential, have attracted the attentions from both academicians and industry players. With a tropical climate, Malaysia has a rich agricultural sector and dense tropical rainforest, giving rise to abundance of biomass which most of them are underutilized. Hence, the biomass 'waste-to-wealth' conversion through various thermochemical conversion technologies and the prospective challenges towards commercialization in Malaysia are reviewed in this paper. In this paper, a critical review about the maturity status of the four most promising thermochemical conversion routes in Malaysia (i.e. gasification, pyrolysis, liquefaction and hydroprocessing) is given. The current development of thermochemical conversion technologies for biomass conversion in Malaysia is also reviewed and benchmarked against global progress. Besides, the core technical challenges in commercializing these green technologies are highlighted as well. Lastly, the future outlook for successful commercialization of these technologies in Malaysia is included.

Process simulation and techno economic analysis of renewable diesel production via catalytic decarboxylation of rubber seed oil - A case study in Malaysia.

This work describes the economic feasibility of hydroprocessed diesel fuel production via catalytic decarboxylation of rubber seed oil in Malaysia. A comprehensive techno-economic assessment is developed using Aspen HYSYS V8.0 software for process modelling and economic cost estimates. The profitability profile and minimum fuels selling price of this synthetic fuels production using rubber seed oil as biomass feedstock are assessed under a set of assumptions for what can be plausibly be achieved in 10-years framework. In this study, renewable diesel processing facility is modelled to be capable of processing 65,000 L of inedible oil per day and producing a total of 20 million litre of renewable diesel product per annual with assumed annual operational days of 347. With the forecasted renewable diesel retail price of 3.64 RM per kg, the pioneering renewable diesel project investment offers an assuring return of investment of 12.1% and net return as high as 1.35 million RM. Sensitivity analysis conducted showed that renewable diesel production cost is most sensitive to rubber seed oil price and hydrogen gas price, reflecting on the relative importance of feedstock prices in the overall profitability profile.

Refining of crude rubber seed oil as a feedstock for biofuel production.

Crude rubber seed oil is a potential source for biofuel production. However it contains undesirable impurities such as peroxides and high oxidative components that not only affect the oil stability, colour and shelf-life but promote insoluble gums formation with time that could cause deposition in the combustion engines. Therefore to overcome these problems the crude rubber seed oil is refined by undergoing degumming and bleaching process. The effect of bleaching earth dosage (15-40 wt %), phosphoric acid dosage (0.5-1.0 wt %) and reaction time (20-40 min) were studied over the reduction of the peroxide value in a refined crude rubber seed oil. The analysis of variance shows that bleaching earth dosage was the most influencing factor followed by reaction time and phosphoric acid dosage. A minimum peroxide value of 0.1 milliequivalents/gram was achieved under optimized conditions of 40 wt % of bleaching earth dosage, 1.0 wt % of phosphoric acid dosage and 20 min of reaction time using Response Surface Methodology design.