Roncal, TomásLorenzo, LeirePrieto-Fernández, SorayaOchoa-Gómez, José R.2022-04-01Roncal , T , Lorenzo , L , Prieto-Fernández , S & Ochoa-Gómez , J R 2022 , ' Purification and concentration of formic acid from formic acid/gluconic acid mixtures by two successive steps of nanofiltration and reactive liquid-liquid extraction ' , Separation and Purification Technology , vol. 286 , 120492 , pp. 120492 . https://doi.org/10.1016/j.seppur.2022.1204921383-5866researchoutputwizard: 11556/1257Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The AuthorsA downstream process for the purification and concentration of formic acid (FA) from FA/gluconic acid (GA) mixtures, obtainable by a coupled biocatalytic reaction of CO2 reduction and glucose oxidation, has been developed. The process involved two technologies: i) a first nanofiltration (NF) step to separate FA and GA, and ii) a second reactive liquid-liquid extraction (RLLE) step to concentrate FA. The NF process, using a Synder NFX membrane, consisted of three NF steps separated into two divergent lines, named permeate and retentate pathways. The first NF was common for both pathways, resulting in a permeate strongly enriched in FA and depleted in GA, and a retentate with opposite characteristics. In the permeate pathway, this first permeate was subjected to a second NF to obtain a 99.6% pure FA permeate. In the retentate pathway, an additional NF step on the first retentate resulted in a concentrated 99.4% pure GA retentate. The final diluted FA permeate was concentrated by RLLE using tri-N-octylamine as extractant in n-octanol, and a final back-extraction with NaOH. The optimized RLLE process involved a 100-fold volume decrease and resulted in a final FA solution (as sodium formate) of 174.5 g/L, 78 times more concentrated than the feed.13644842enginfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessjournal article10.1016/j.seppur.2022.120492Formic acidGluconic acidDownstreamNanofiltrationReactive liquid-liquid extractionFormic acidGluconic acidDownstreamNanofiltrationReactive liquid-liquid extractionAnalytical ChemistryFiltration and SeparationSDG 13 - Climate ActionProject IDinfo:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/761042/EU/BIOtechnological processes based on microbial platforms for the CONversion of CO2 from ironsteel industry into commodities for chemicals and plastics/BIOCONCO2info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/761042/EU/BIOtechnological processes based on microbial platforms for the CONversion of CO2 from ironsteel industry into commodities for chemicals and plastics/BIOCONCO2Funding InfoThis work has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 761042 (BIOCON-CO2).This work has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 761042 (BIOCON-CO2).http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85123380533&partnerID=8YFLogxK