Hybrid Route to Produce Acrylic Acid from Sugarcane Molasses

This work presents the synthesis of acrylic acid by hybrid route from sugarcane molasses fermentation and later acid lactic dehydration. Lactic acid was produced by sugarcane molasses fermentation using the Lactobacillus plantarum CCT 5731 bacteria in bioreactor BioFlo 415 at 37 °C. After of 46.4 h of fermentation 50.6 g/L of lactic acid was obtained with productivity of 1.1 g/L.h which was subsequently concentred to 152 g/L and stored to dehydration stage. Both commercial lactic acid and lactic acid obtained through fermentation stage were dehydrated by catalysts supported on basic zeolite (NaY) in a tubular reactor at 300 °C and continuous flow of CO2 (30 mL/min). The largest selectivity (25.7 %) for acrylic acid was obtained when the commercial lactic acid and KBr/NaY were used. When lactic acid obtained by fermentation a maximum acrylic acid selectivity of 16.7 % was achieved using KI/NaY. All chemicals species were characterized by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC).