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Pretreatment of Lignocellulosic Biomass with Low-cost Ionic Liquids
Published on: August 10, 2016
Biorefining of lignocellulosic feedstock--Technical, economic and environmental considerations
Lin Luo1, Ester van der Voet, Gjalt Huppes
1Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML), Leiden University, P.O. Box 9518, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands. luo@cml.leidenuniv.nl
Abstract:
Biorefinery, an example of a multiple products system, integrates biomass conversion processes and equipment to produce fuels, power and chemicals from biomass. This study focuses on technical design, economic and environmental analysis of a lignocellulosic feedstock (LCF) biorefinery producing ethanol, succinic acid, acetic acid and electricity. As the potential worldwide demand of succinic acid and its derivatives can reach 30 million tons per year, succinic acid is a promising high-value product if production cost and market price are substantially lowered. The results of the economic analysis show that the designed refinery has great potentials compared to the single-output ethanol plant; even when the price of succinic acid is lowered or the capital investment doubled. In terms of eco-efficiency, the LCF biorefinery shows better environmental performances mainly in global warming potential due to CO(2) fixation during acid fermentation. The overall evaluation of the eco-efficiency depends on the importance attached to each impact category.
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