Techno-Economic Analysis of the Levulinic Acid Synthesis from Monosaccharides

Levulinic acid (LA) has been reported as an important building block in the road map of converting biomass to value added compounds. Since LA is a versatile molecule, techno-economic analysis of its production from C-6 monosaccharides has been investigated. In this study, the process of glucose and fructose conversion to LA was designed in an aqueous solution in presence of HCl as the homogeneous acid catalyst based on published data. In order to perform the economic analysis, parameters were considered as feed mass flow rate 300 tons/day, working days per year 330, plant lifetime of 20 years, and 10% internal interest rate. Based on economic evaluations, the minimum selling price (MSP) of LA produced from fructose and glucose were 1.457 and 1.628 $/Kg, respectively. Sensitivity analysis was conducted to investigate different parameters impacts on MSP. Results indicate that feed price and product yield are major affecting parameters.