Development of a recovery process to produce glycerin, glycerides, free fatty acid (FFA) and potassium phosphate from the byproduct of a process removing FFA from used cooking oil

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Earth Renu Energy Corp. (Earth Renu) is a B.C. owned and operated company seeking to produce sustainable energy and chemicals from end of life triglycerides and fatty acids obtained from urban organic waste, and more specifically from yellow grease and grease trap waste. This is topical as many municipalities in Canada are starting to ban disposal of organic wastes in landfills. One of the undesirable components in waste vegetable oil for the production of biodiesel is the Free Fatty Acid (FFA), resulting from the degradation of vegetable oil, which create challenges and increase production costs. Earth Renu has developed a proprietary process to remove the FFA and produce a premium feedstock for biodiesel production, comparable to virgin vegetable oil. The FFA-removal process generates spent glycerin, which can be processed further to produce technical glycerin and potassium phosphate. The proposed research extends the feasibility of the spent glycerin refining process by running experiments in a lab scale, and optimizing the process through computer simulations. The research project will aim at developing a complete glycerin and chemical recovery process, economically viable on a small scale, and should lead to Earth Renu designing, building and testing a pre-commercial pilot plant.