Coupling method for converting lactic acid and extracting lactic acid from aqueous lactate raw material
Technical Field
The present invention relates to the production and conversion of lactic acid, and is especially the phase-coupled process of converting lactic acid from water containing lactate.
Background
Lactic acid is widely used in the fields of food, medicine, chemical industry, new materials and the like, for example, as a flavoring agent, an antistaling agent, a preservative and the like in the food industry, and as a cosolvent, a prodrug preparation, a carrier agent and the like in the medicine industry. Polylactic acid (PLA) synthesized by taking lactic acid as a monomer is a new bio-based degradation material which is mainly supported by China, can replace petrochemical-based plastic products, and eliminates the white pollution of the environment. At present, the biological fermentation method is mostly adopted for producing lactic acid in industry. The lactic acid fermentation liquor is a system with very complex components, and besides lactic acid or lactate, a large amount of thalli, protein, residual sugar, pigment, inorganic salt, byproduct organic acid, unconverted starch and the like exist, and the existence of the impurities brings great difficulty for the subsequent separation and purification of lactic acid, so that the product is obtained through a long process.
In the process of producing lactic acid by fermentation, the pH in the fermentation broth decreases to a level that affects the fermentation activity of the microorganism as the produced lactic acid increases. A commonly used method is the addition of a base, salt or metal oxide that can be neutralized with lactic acid, including but not limited to calcium carbonate, calcium hydroxide, magnesium oxide, magnesium hydroxide, sodium carbonate, ammonium hydroxide, and the like. Therefore, most of the lactic acid in the fermentation broth obtained by the method is free lactate anion, and the free lactate ion needs to be converted into lactic acid through acidification in the subsequent process.
Taking a common calcium salt acidification method as an example, calcium carbonate is added in the fermentation process to neutralize the generated lactic acid to form calcium lactate, the used acidulant is sulfuric acid, and calcium sulfate solids are separated and removed after acidification to obtain a crude lactic acid solution. The process is the main method for producing the lactic acid at present, has the advantages of mature process, easy control and the like, but the concentrated sulfuric acid used for acidification and the generated calcium sulfate can cause pollution.
CN103153935A discloses a method for preparing barium lactate by reacting sugar with barium hydroxide, and contacting with ammonia or amine and with carbon dioxide, or with carbonate and/or bicarbonate of ammonia or amine, thereby preparing lactic acid-amine complex and barium carbonate. The method takes sugar as raw material, generates lactic acid by a chemical reaction method, and provides an extraction scheme of the lactic acid. The method chemically produces lactic acid, and provides a method for extracting lactic acid. However, lactic acid produced by the method is racemic, heavy metal is used in the method, and the product is a lactic acid-amine complex which still needs to be further separated.
The study on the conversion of calcium lactate to lactic acid under supercritical conditions [ C ]// tenth national academy of supercritical fluid technology and application, and the third academy of supercritical fluid technology at both sides of the strait, 2015, 386-392, proposes that carbon dioxide in a supercritical state can be used as an acidulant to produce calcium carbonate solids. Wherein the carbon dioxide can be derived from the fermentation process and the calcium carbonate produced can also be recycled as a neutralising agent for the fermentation process. Meanwhile, the method does not use sulfuric acid which is easy to cause pollution, does not generate a large amount of waste such as calcium sulfate, and is a green pollution-free separation method. However, studies have also found that the process conditions to achieve high conversion are: the temperature is 31-32 ℃, the pressure is 13-14MPa, the calcium lactate accounts for 2.3 percent of the mass fraction of the fermentation broth, the reaction balance can be achieved within 1.5h, and the conversion rate can reach more than 80 percent. There is a first problem: the operating pressure is too high; the second problem is that: the content of calcium lactate in the fermentation broth is far lower than that of lactate in the fermentation broth generated in the fermentation process under the industrial operation scale (the mass fraction of lactate in the fermentation broth is more than 10 percent). When the mass fraction of calcium lactate is 10%, the conversion rate is less than 25%.
Disclosure of Invention
In order to solve the problems of low conversion rate, solid waste generation and other pollution, harsh conversion conditions and the like of conversion and extraction of lactic acid in the post-treatment process of aqueous lactate solution, particularly fermentation liquor after lactic acid fermentation in the prior art, the invention provides a method for coupling the conversion and extraction of lactic acid from aqueous lactate raw material, which realizes the conversion and extraction of lactic acid simultaneously under relatively mild conditions and has higher conversion rate.
The technical purpose is realized by the following technical scheme:
a coupling method for converting lactic acid from a water-containing raw material of lactate and extracting the lactic acid comprises the steps of mixing the water-containing raw material of the lactate with an organic solvent, continuously introducing carbon dioxide into the mixed solution, reacting at a pressure of more than or equal to 7MPa and a temperature of more than or equal to 30 ℃, and separating an organic phase and a water phase after the reaction is finished, wherein the organic phase contains the lactic acid;
the organic solvent is an organic solvent which can dissolve lactic acid but is not completely dissolved with water, and is selected from at least one of esters, ethers and ketones with the C atom number being more than or equal to 5.
Further, in the above method, the organic solvent is at least one selected from the group consisting of methyl isobutyl ketone, diethyl ether and n-butyl acetate.
Further, in the above method, the aqueous raw material of lactate and the organic solvent are mixed in a weight ratio of 1:1-1:20, preferably 1:3-1:6.
further, in the above method, the lactate salt in the aqueous lactate salt material comprises 1% to 50%, preferably 2% to 30%, and most preferably 4% to 20% by weight of lactate.
Furthermore, in the method, after the carbon dioxide is introduced, the pressure is kept to be more than or equal to 7.29MPa, and the temperature is kept to be more than or equal to 31.26 ℃.
Further, in the above method, after the carbon dioxide is introduced, the pressure is maintained at 7.3 to 12MPa, preferably 7.3 to 10MPa.
Further, in the above method, after the introduction of carbon dioxide, the reaction temperature is maintained at 32 to 60 ℃, preferably 45 to 55 ℃.
Further, in the above method, the reaction time is 1 to 3 hours after the introduction of carbon dioxide.
In the above method, the organic phase and the aqueous phase are separated by allowing the reaction solution to stand for separation after the reaction is completed, and then reducing the pressure of carbon dioxide after the separation.
Further, in the above process, due to the different types of lactate in the raw material, after separation of the organic phase and the aqueous phase, a solid phase may also be present, for example, when the lactate is calcium lactate, calcium carbonate solids may be produced and may be reused in the lactic acid fermentation process.
Further, in the above method, the aqueous material of lactate is previously subjected to sterilization treatment.
In the above process, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that lactic acid in the aqueous feed of lactate salt, either in the form of free lactate ions or in undissociated form, may be used in the process of the present invention.
Compared with the prior art, the method has the following advantages:
(1) The method selects a mode of combining the organic solvent which can dissolve the lactic acid but is not completely miscible with water with the carbon dioxide high-pressure treatment, can simultaneously convert and extract the lactic acid from the water-containing raw material, and compared with the traditional sulfuric acid acidification method, the method uses the carbon dioxide to replace sulfuric acid as an acidifier, does not generate calcium sulfate solid waste, and is a green pollution-free separation method.
(2) For the existing lactic acid fermentation process, calcium carbonate is used for adjusting the pH value in the general fermentation liquid process, the lactic acid in the fermentation liquid generally exists in the form of calcium lactate, and after the conversion and extraction of the lactic acid are carried out by adopting the method disclosed by the invention, calcium carbonate solid is generated and can be reused in the fermentation process to realize the full utilization of the solid, so that the method cannot generate solid waste which is difficult to utilize and treat.
(3) Compared with the method only using carbon dioxide as an acidulant, the method has lower operation pressure and higher conversion rate, and the extraction and extraction of lactic acid are synchronously carried out, thereby simplifying the post-treatment process and having mild reaction conditions.
Additional features and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the detailed description which follows.
Detailed Description
The following describes the embodiments of the present invention in detail. It should be understood that the detailed description and specific examples, while indicating the preferred embodiment of the invention, are given by way of illustration and explanation only, not limitation.
Example 1
Adding 100g of sterilized water-containing feed liquid containing calcium lactate into a reaction kettle, wherein the mass fraction of lactate in the water-containing feed liquid is 12%, adding 400g of organic solvent methyl isobutyl ketone, introducing carbon dioxide into the reaction kettle, pressurizing to 8MPa, heating to 50 ℃, keeping constant temperature and constant pressure, and fully stirring for reaction for 1.5h. And after the reaction is finished, standing and layering the reaction liquid, transferring the organic phase to a buffer tank which is pressurized to be equal to the pressure of the reaction kettle in advance through a lateral line pipeline of the reaction kettle at the height of a phase interface, separating inorganic phase, then cooling and depressurizing, recovering carbon dioxide, and dissolving lactic acid in the organic phase. And then separating lactic acid by a water phase back extraction method to obtain a lactic acid aqueous solution, measuring the content of the lactic acid by using liquid chromatography, and calculating the conversion rate.
Example 2
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the reaction temperature was changed to 60 ℃.
Example 3
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the reaction temperature was changed to 32 ℃.
Example 4
The conditions were the same as in example 3 except that the calcium lactate-containing aqueous feed solution was used in which the mass fraction of lactate was 4%.
Example 5
The conditions were the same as in example 3, except that an aqueous feed solution containing sodium lactate was used.
Example 6
The same conditions as in example 1 were used except that the organic solvent was changed to diethyl ether.
Example 7
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the organic solvent was changed to n-butyl acetate.
Example 8
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the reaction pressure was changed to 7.3 MPa.
Example 9
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the reaction pressure was changed to 10MPa.
Example 10
The reaction conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the reaction time was changed to 2.5 hours.
Example 11
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the reaction pressure was changed to 12 MPa.
Example 12
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the calcium lactate-containing aqueous feed solution was used in which the mass fraction of lactate was 16%.
Example 13
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the calcium lactate-containing aqueous feed solution was used in which the mass fraction of lactate was 20%.
Example 14
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the calcium lactate-containing aqueous feed liquid was used in which the mass fraction of lactate was 30%.
Example 15
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the mass ratio of the aqueous feed liquid to the organic solvent was 1.
Example 16
The conditions were the same as in example 1 except that the mass ratio of the aqueous feed liquid to the organic solvent was 1.
Comparative example 1
An aqueous solution of lactic acid was obtained after solid-liquid separation under the same operating conditions as in example 1 except that no organic solvent was added, and the conversion was calculated by measuring the lactic acid content by liquid chromatography.
The results of conversion of lactate in the above examples and comparative examples are shown in Table 1.
TABLE 1
The above non-limiting examples are intended to provide those of ordinary skill in the art with a more complete understanding of the present invention, and are not intended to limit the invention in any way.