Jamaica Biofuels Report - Ministry of Energy

Pilot Project: Biodiesel RefineryBackgroundAs the National Biofuels Policy indicates, development of biodiesel in Jamaica is in its infancy. ThePetroleum Corporation of Jamaica’s Center of Excellence for Renewable Energy is conductingexploratory research to identify promising crops and their potential under local conditions and likelyproductivity on marginal lands. Most of the recent effort has focused on jatropha curcas and castor,both of which have been the subject of small field trials.Given the early stage of biodiesel feedstock development, determining the size and location of aprocessing facility is difficult, as is predicting the likely cost of raw material to the prospective processor.For this reason, the “pilot project” described here is a generic one, designed to illustrate the economicrelationships among feedstock cost, processing plant scale and product selling price. The approach is toestimate what the processor could afford to pay for vegetable oils from jatropha, castor or othersources, since a target price in this form could be useful in designing and evaluating approaches tocultivation and harvesting.Overview of optionsOilseed ProductionSection 2.6 of the main report discusses sources of biodiesel in detail. Based on Brazilian experience, thecost of small-scale production of castor beans, for example, containing 48% oil, is US $0.50 per Kilo($1.00 per Kilo of oil), which amounts to $3.40 per gallon, or roughly twice the cost of crude oil.Large-scale mechanized production of castor or jatropha could be less costly, but it might also displacesugarcane. As a large-scale field crop, soy might be a better alternative, since it has food as well asenergy value. Another solution would be higher oil-yielding palm trees, which would not compete withcane for land and could possibly provide solid fuel for off-season sugar mill operation.Conversion TechnologyFrom a processing standpoint, as illustrated in Section 6 of the main report above, oilseeds will beharvested manually and/or mechanically and sent to a crusher for extraction of crude vegetable oil.Recycled oil can also be used, but depending on its free fatty acid (FAA) content, pretreatment may beneeded (Fig. 1). However, such a unit can be ordered as a standard part of the integrated modularbiodiesel unit to allow maximal flexibility in dealing with a variety of virgin and recycled feedstocks.The oil is subsequently led through a series of vessels, where the transesterification process takes placeat 50-60 0 C in the presence of excess methanol and potassium hydroxide, which catalyzes the reaction.This standard process leads to the formation of primarily a mix of methyl esters (biodiesel) and glycerinin a weight ratio of approximately 10:1.101