Maximizing fossil fuel displacement and limiting atmospheric carbon dioxide levels require a high efficiency of carbon incorporation in bioenergy systems. The availability of biomass carbon is a constraint globally, and strategies to increase the efficiency of bioenergy production and biogenic carbon use are needed. Previous studies have shown that “energy upgrading” of biomass by coupling with renewable electricity through electrocatalytic hydrogenation offers a potential pathway to near full petroleum fuel displacement in the U.S., even when annual U.S. biomass production is limited to 1.2 billion dry tonnes. Commercialization of such technology requires economic feasibility. A technoeconomic model of decentralized, depot-based pyrolysis with electrocatalytic hydrogenation and centralized upgrading (Py-ECH), producing liquid hydrocarbon fuel is presented and compared to a cellulosic ethanol pathway using consistent assumptions. Using a discounted cash flow approach, a minimum fuel selling price (MFSP) of $3.62 per gallon gasoline equivalent (GGE) or $0.96 per gasoline liter equivalent (GLE) is estimated for Py-ECH fuel derived from corn stover, considering n th plant economics and a fixed internal rate of return of 10%. This is comparable to the MFSP for cellulosic ethanol from fermentation with the same feedstock ($3.71 per GGE or $0.98 per GLE) and is in the range of gasoline prices over the last 20 years of $1 per GGE ($0.26 per GLE) to $4.44 per GGE ($1.17 per GLE) in 2018. Optimization studies on depot sizing identified a trade-off between transportation and economies-of-scale costs, with an optimum size of 500 tpd. Sensitivity analyses showed that electricity cost, raw material costs, bio-oil yields, and cell efficiencies are the key parameters that affect the Py-ECH MFSP. With system improvements, a pathway to less than $3 per GGE or $0.79 per GLE is articulated for liquid hydrocarbon fuel from corn stover using Py-ECH.
more »
« less
Formate‐assisted pyrolysis of biomass: an economic and modeling analysis
An economic analysis was performed to determine the economic potential and commercialization barriers of producing renewable gasoline and diesel (RGD) fuel blendstocks via formate‐assisted pyrolysis (FAsP) followed by hydrodeoxygenation processes. A process model was simulated using Aspen Plus® to estimate material and energy balances for the conversion of 2000 dry MT per day of pine sawdust. Scenarios were considered for the regeneration of formate salts from either ‐biomass‐derived and natural‐gas‐derived carbon monoxide. The material and energy balances were used to calculate capital and operating costs of RGD fuel production. An economic model was built using capital and operating costs to estimate the minimum selling price (MSP) of RGD fuel. The MSP of RGD fuels were estimated at $4.58 per gallon of gasoline equivalent (GGE) and $4.80 per GGE for natural gas and biomass‐derived CO scenarios, respectively. The total capital investments of these plants were $448 million and $497 million. The feedstock cost was found to be the major cost contributor to the MSP of RGD fuel. Improving FAsP process yields will significantly reduce the production cost of RGD fuel. It has been learned that an increase in deoxygenation of bio‐oil in pyrolysis reactor decreases the capital and operating costs of bio‐oil upgrading to RGD fuel. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd
more » « less- PAR ID:
- 10044794
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Biofuels, Bioproducts and Biorefining
- Volume:
- 12
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 1932-104X
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- p. 45-55
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Biofuels produced via thermochemical conversions of waste biomass could be sustainable alternatives to fossil fuels but currently require costly downstream upgrading to be used in existing infrastructure. In this work, we explore how a low-cost, abundant clay mineral, bentonite, could serve as an in situ heterogeneous catalyst for two different thermochemical conversion processes: pyrolysis and hydrothermal carbonization (HTC). Avocado pits were combined with 20 wt% bentonite clay and were pyrolyzed at 600 °C and hydrothermally carbonized at 250 °C, commonly used conditions across the literature. During pyrolysis, bentonite clay promoted Diels–Alder reactions that transformed furans to aromatic compounds, which decreased the bio-oil oxygen content and produced a fuel closer to being suitable for existing infrastructure. The HTC bio-oil without the clay catalyst contained 100% furans, mainly 5-methylfurfural, but in the presence of the clay, approximately 25% of the bio-oil was transformed to 2-methyl-2-cyclopentenone, thereby adding two hydrogen atoms and removing one oxygen. The use of clay in both processes decreased the relative oxygen content of the bio-oils. Proximate analysis of the resulting chars showed an increase in fixed carbon (FC) and a decrease in volatile matter (VM) with clay inclusion. By containing more FC, the HTC-derived char may be more stable than pyrolysis-derived char for environmental applications. The addition of bentonite clay to both processes did not produce significantly different bio-oil yields, such that by adding a clay catalyst, a more valuable bio-oil was produced without reducing the amount of bio-oil recovered.more » « less
-
Roosa, Stephen A (Ed.)This experimental process demonstrates the potential of advancing the technology of lignocellulosic-based biofuels. Maximized bio-oil yields and gasoline range aromatics were obtained from the pyrolysis of switchgrass biomass in a medium-scale fixed bed reactor (48.2 L). The reaction’s final temperature was set at 520ºC while the carrier gas flow rate was varied at (50 L min-1, 75 L min-1 and 100 L min-1) both without and with the use of the ZSM-5 catalyst. Bio-oil yields of 18.2%, 26.9%, and 34.1% were generated without catalyst. Using the ZSM-5 catalyst, bio-oil yields of 20.2%, 41.5%, and 47.7% were generated. At 75 L min-1, 9.6% gasoline range organics (GROs) were detected without the catalyst and 12.4% aromatics were detected in the experiment with ZSM-5 catalyst. At 100 L min-1, 10.5%, and 13.7% of aromatics were detected without and with ZSM-5 catalyst respectively. At 75 L min-1, 14.5% of oxygen content recorded without catalyst, and 5.6% with ZSM-5 catalyst. At 100 L min-1, oxygen content was 10.4% without catalyst, and 8.6 % with ZSM-5 catalyst. The effects of carrier gas flow rate variations and a ZSM-5 catalyst on bio-oil yields and quality were experimentally demonstrated using a single-step thermochemical conversion process. This is a major development towards improving U.S energy security and achieving global CO2 emissions mitigation targets.more » « less
-
more » « less
Abstract Techno‐economic assessment of bio‐oil production from fast pyrolysis of pine was explored through process simulation. In this work, bio‐oil production via a one‐step pyrolysis route and a two‐step pyrolysis which included a torrefaction step before fast pyrolysis were modeled to process 1000
MT /day of dry feed (dry basis) through the pyrolyzer at a temperature of 530 °C while two‐step ‐pyrolysis was investigated at three different torrefaction temperatures of 290, 310, and 330 °C. Different scenarios that included the use of fossil energy to produce process heat as well as use of renewable energy either through the combustion of char or a portion of the condensates from ‐torrefaction were also investigated. Economic analysis indicates that a torrefaction step results in a reduction in the minimum selling price of bio‐oil produced which reduced further with ‐torrefaction ‐temperature with lowest bio‐oil price of $1.04/gal obtained for a two‐step pyrolysis at torrefaction ‐temperature of 330 °C in comparison to $1.32/gal for a one‐step process. Minimum selling price of bio‐oil on an energy basis however suggests a higher price of about $22.19/GJ for a two‐step in ‐comparison to $16.89/GJ for a one‐step. There could be a trade‐offs between the higher quality and the higher selling price considering the downstream upgrade step to hydrocarbon fuel. © 2016 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd -
more » « less
Abstract Vaccine manufacturing strategies that lower capital and production costs could improve vaccine access by reducing the cost per dose and encouraging localized manufacturing. Continuous processing is increasingly utilized to drive lower costs in biological manufacturing by requiring fewer capital and operating resources. Aqueous two‐phase systems (ATPS) are a liquid–liquid extraction technique that enables continuous processing for viral vectors. To date, no economic comparison between viral vector purifications using traditional methods and ATPS has been published. In this work, economic simulations of traditional chromatography‐based virus purification were compared to ATPS‐based virus purification for the same product output in both batch and continuous modes. First, the modeling strategy was validated by re‐creating a viral subunit manufacturing economic simulation. Then, ATPS capital and operating costs were compared to that of a traditional chromatography purification at multiple scales. At all scales, ATPS purification required less than 10% of the capital expenditure compared to chromatography‐based purification. At an 11 kg per year production scale, the ATPS production costs were 50% less than purification with chromatography. Other chromatography configurations were explored, and may provide a production cost benefit to ATPS, but the purity and recovery were not experimentally verified. Batch and continuous ATPS were similar in capital and production costs. However, manual price adjustments suggest that continuous ATPS plant‐building costs could be less than half that of batch ATPS at the 11 kg per year production scale. These simulations show the significant reduction in manufacturing costs that ATPS‐based purification could deliver to the vaccine industry.
