Biodiesel production using immobilized lipase: feasibility and challenges

Abstract

Fatty acid alkyl esters (FAAE, also known as biodiesel) is one of the best alternatives to fossil fuels. Biodiesel can be synthesized via transesterification of oil with alcohol by either chemical or enzymatic catalysis. In particular, immobilized lipase as biocatalyst for transesterification has recently drawn great attention due to its environmental and economic benefits over conventional chemical catalytic processes. This paper provides an in‐depth review of the feasibility and the challenges of biodiesel production catalyzed by immobilized lipase, with the emphasis on lipase immobilization techniques, factors affecting biodiesel synthesis, and whole cell catalysis. It is necessary to upgrade the existing methods and to further exploit new techniques to make the immobilized lipase‐catalyzed biodiesel synthesis technically feasible and commercially viable for practical applications. © 2016 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Water-Retaining Polymers in Organic Solvent Increase Lipase Activity for Biodiesel Synthesis

“…Biodiesel is a potential alternative to fossil fuels constituted of monoalkyl fatty acid esters including long chain fatty acids that can be derived from vegetable oil, animal fats, and microbial oil. Furthermore, due to their environmental and economic benefits, lipase-catalyzed biodiesel synthesis is a valid alternative to the conventional chemical catalytic processes [6].…”

“…In addition, we have also investigated the possibility to exploit Aquasorb as enzyme support for immobilization, with the purpose to improve the enzyme properties [6].…”

Lipase Catalyzed Methanolysis of Tri-(12-Hydroxy Stearoyl)-Glycerol in Organic Solvents

“…Water will affect the structure of the enzyme and excessive water produced during hydrolysis can interfere with methanolysis as a result of the competing hydrolytic reaction [11].…”

Recent advances on sources and industrial applications of lipases

“…This is mainly because the lipase‐catalyzed processes are less energy intensive and exhibit easy product recovery. Recent studies revealed that lipase‐catalyzed transesterification was found to be effective for biodiesel synthesis using waste oils from food industry, which are cheap, nonedible and abundantly available worldwide . It is interesting to note from another study that lipase‐catalyzed biodiesel production presents advantages over conventional processes in terms of eliminating the problem of saturated monoacylglycerol (MAG), which affects the physical properties of bio‐fuels leading to engine failure.…”

“…Recent studies revealed that lipasecatalyzed transesterification was found to be effective for biodiesel synthesis using waste oils from food industry, which are cheap, nonedible and abundantly available worldwide. 3,12,30,34,188,199,207,208 It is interesting to note from another study that lipase-catalyzed biodiesel production presents advantages over conventional processes in terms of eliminating the problem of saturated monoacylglycerol (MAG), which affects the physical properties of bio-fuels leading to engine failure. This issue has been well explored by Padhi et al, 130 and they proposed the conversion of MAG to fatty acid methyl esters (FAMEs) through transesterification of glycerol using the lipase synthesized from Penicillium camemberti.…”