Manuel Wagenhofer

PhD student

Catalysis Research Center and Chemistry Department

Technische Universität München

Lichtenbergstraße 4

85748 Garching, Germany

Curriculum:

Since 2013        PhD student at Technische Universität München under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Johannes A. Lercher

2011 - 2013       Master of Science at Technische Universität München
(Master Thesis: Influence of Framework and Local Environment of
Brønsted Acid Sites on the Cracking of 1-Pentene over Zeolites)

2007 - 2011       Bachelor of Science at Technische Universität München

Research:

Catalytic hydroconversion of microalgae oil to jet fuel using conventional refinery technologies

In the face of growing energy demand by emerging economies and the exhaustible nature of fossil fuels, renewable resources have become a topic of high interest for the energy and transportation sector [1]. The aviation industry, with its self-imposed goals on climate protection, is presently putting significant effort into the promotion of research related to the production of biogenic aviation fuels [2]. Microalgae are an attractive biomass feedstock to produce these kinds of biofuels due to their high cellular lipid contents and high photosynthetic rates. Further, their cultivation can be considered socially and environmentally benign, as it does not directly compete with agricultural products or freshwater supply [3–5].

Since aviation fuel has to meet very stringent international specifications, the microalgae oil has to be processed prior to its use in jet turbines. One possibility to achieve this is the hydrodeoxygenation (HDO) of the microalgal triglyceride mixture over sulfided transition metal catalysts (TMS). Since this type of catalyst is already established in petroleum refineries for the removal of sulfur and nitrogen from heavy petroleum fractions, the HDO of triglycerides can be implemented at very low capital investment by using existing infrastructure [6].

The main objective of our work is to find an efficient, TMS-based catalyst system for the HDO of microalgae oil to aviation fuel. It is important to gain a fundamental understanding of the target reaction at the microscopic level, i.e. the elementary reaction steps taking place at the surface of the catalyst during triglyceride hydrodeoxygenation. We hope these insights will provide a means for increasing the catalytic performance in terms of activity, selectivity and stability under industrial conditions.

References

[1]        R. W. Gosselink, S. A. Hollak, S. W. Chang, J. van Haveren, K. P. de Jong, J. H. Bitter and D. S. van Es, ChemSusChem 2013, 6, 1576.

[2]        M. Mohammad, T. Kandaramath Hari, Z. Yaakob, Y. Chandra Sharma and K. Sopian, Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 2013, 22, 121.

[3]        A. Ahmad, N. Yasin, C. Derek and J. Lim, Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 2011, 15, 584.

[4]        G. Huang, F. Chen, D. Wei, X. Zhang, G. Chen, Appl. Energy 2010, 87, 38.

[5]        G. W. Huber, S. Iborra, A. Corma, Chem. Rev. 2006, 106, 4044.

[6]        C. Zhao, T. Brück and J. A. Lercher, Green Chemistry 2013, 15, 1720.

Own publications

S. Schallmoser, T. Ikuno, M.F. Wagenhofer, R. Kolvenbach, G.L. Haller, M. Sanchez-Sanchez, J.A. Lercher, Impact of the local environment of Brønsted acid sites in ZSM-5 on the catalytic activity in n-pentane cracking, Journal of Catalysis 2014, 316, 93-102.