[Gasification] Catalytic Fast Pyrolysis, turns biomass into "Green gasoline"

Sat Apr 12 11:10:30 CDT 2008

Interesting. First question that comes to mind are --
What sort of yields are possible - or I should say demonstrable - for such a
process? That is, how much of the gasoline components per weight of biomass?
Bill Hauserman, PE

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bruno M." <brunoM1 at telenet.be>
To: <gasification at listserv.repp.org>
Sent: Friday, April 11, 2008 8:55 PM
Subject: [Gasification] Catalytic Fast Pyrolysis,turns biomass into "Green
gasoline"

Catalytic fast pyrolysis turns plant biomass such as wood and grasses into
"green gasoline"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080407102812.htm

ScienceDaily (Apr. 8, 2008)  Researchers have made a breakthrough in the
development of "green gasoline," a liquid identical to standard gasoline yet
created from sustainable biomass sources like switchgrass and poplar trees.

Reporting in the April 7, 2008 issue of Chemistry & Sustainability, Energy &
Materials (ChemSusChem), chemical engineer and National Science Foundation
(NSF) CAREER awardee George Huber of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst
(UMass) and his graduate students Torren Carlson and Tushar Vispute
announced the first direct conversion of plant cellulose into gasoline
components.

In the same issue, James Dumesic and colleagues from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison announce an integrated process for creating chemical
components of jet fuel using a green gasoline approach. While Dumesic's
group had previously demonstrated the production of jet-fuel components
using separate steps, their current work shows that the steps can be
integrated and run sequentially, without complex separation and purification
processes between reactors.

While it may be five to 10 years before green gasoline arrives at the pump
or finds its way into a fighter jet, these breakthroughs have bypassed
significant hurdles to bringing green gasoline biofuels to market.

"It is likely that the future consumer will not even know that they are
putting biofuels into their car," said Huber. "Biofuels in the future will
most likely be similar in chemical composition to gasoline and diesel fuel
used today. The challenge for chemical engineers is to efficiently produce
liquid fuels from biomass while fitting into the existing infrastructure
today."

For their new approach, the UMass researchers rapidly heated cellulose in
the presence of solid catalysts, materials that speed up reactions without
sacrificing themselves in the process. They then rapidly cooled the products
to create a liquid that contains many of the compounds found in gasoline.

The entire process was completed in under two minutes using relatively
moderate amounts of heat. The compounds that formed in that single step,
like naphthalene and toluene, make up one fourth of the suite of chemicals
found in gasoline. The liquid can be further treated to form the remaining
fuel components or can be used "as is" for a high octane gasoline blend.

"Green gasoline is an attractive alternative to bioethanol since it can be
used in existing engines and does not incur the 30 percent gas mileage
penalty of ethanol-based flex fuel," said John Regalbuto, who directs the
Catalysis and Biocatalysis Program at NSF and supported this research.

"In theory it requires much less energy to make than ethanol, giving it a
smaller carbon footprint and making it cheaper to produce," Regalbuto said.
"Making it from cellulose sources such as switchgrass or poplar trees grown
as energy crops, or forest or agricultural residues such as wood chips or
corn stover, solves the lifecycle greenhouse gas problem that has recently
surfaced with corn ethanol and soy biodiesel."

Beyond academic laboratories, both small businesses and Fortune 500
petroleum refiners are pursuing green gasoline. Companies are designing ways
to hybridize their existing refineries to enable petroleum products
including fuels, textiles, and plastics to be made from either crude oil or
biomass and the military community has shown strong interest in making jet
fuel and diesel from the same sources.

"Huber's new process for the direct conversion of cellulose to gasoline
aromatics is at the leading edge of the new 'Green Gasoline' alternate
energy paradigm that NSF, along with other federal agencies, is helping to
promote," states Regalbuto.

Not only is the method a compact way to treat a great deal of biomass in a
short time, Regalbuto emphasized that the process, in principle, does not
require any external energy. "In fact, from the extra heat that will be
released, you can generate electricity in addition to the biofuel," he said.
"There will not be just a small carbon footprint for the process; by
recovering heat and generating electricity, there won't be any footprint."

The latest pathways to produce green gasoline, green diesel and green jet
fuel are found in a report sponsored by NSF, the Department of Energy and
the American Chemical Society entitled "Breaking the Chemical and
Engineering Barriers to Lignocellulosic Biofuels: Next Generation
Hydrocarbon Biorefineries" released April 1. In the report, Huber and a host
of leaders from academia, industry and government present a plan for making
green gasoline a practical solution for the impending fuel crisis.

"We are currently working on understanding the chemistry of this process and
designing new catalysts and reactors for this single step technique. This
fundamental chemical understanding will allow us to design more efficient
processes that will accelerate the commercialization of green gasoline,"
Huber said.

Adapted from materials provided by <http://www.nsf.gov>National Science
Foundation.
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