Assessment and mitigation of contaminants in renewable sources of oils and fats for HVO production

The work describes the HVO process and the importance of the Pretreatment Unit (PTU) on feedstock quality parameters.  The impacts of feedstocks on PTU design considerations will be discussed by presenting the evaluation of raw materials including analytical assessment of select parameters, the chemical structure of contaminants in different lipid matrices, and conceptual versus practical challenges in the PTU steps of degumming, washing, and adsorption.

The work presents alternatives for the application of feedstocks and the importance of research and development on process design for challenging, new, and future raw materials.

The work will also present new development paths for processing challenging raw materials, improving equipment lifetime, and addressing a wider range of contaminants.