This work presents a low cost facile fermentative production of 1,3 propanediol as a high value downstream product from Industrial glycerol obtained from a biodiesel plant. The bacterial innocula grown from organic farm soils in selective media show excellent performance in converting glycerol to 1,3 propanediol with the latter being the major fermentation product. The bacterial inncolum also showed good resistance to a fairly high concentration of excess phosphates in the glycerol obtained and purified from continuous biodiesel production. Yields of upto 0.6 mol of 1,3 propanediol were obtained per mole of glycerol in batches carried out under pH control. The total solvent production went up with decreasing pH without any observed increase in ethanol production. A continuous run with industrial glycerol, while cycling between pH values was taken with interesting results. The bacterial culture also exhibited good solvent resistance to fairly high concentrations of 1,3 propanediol in the broth.

Efficient fermentative production of 1,3 propanediol from industrial waste glycerol and soil based bacterial innocula

245th National Meeting (2013)

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