Assessment of Conversion Technologies for Bioalcohol Fuel ...

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APPENDIX 1 - TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPER PROFILES This appendix summarizes the information gathered by the study on organizations engaged in active development of technologies for producing ethanol, or other forms of alcohol fuel, from cellulosic biomass feedstocks. Over fifty organizations worldwide were identified during the course of the study as possibly pursuing such technologies. Most of these organizations responded to a survey questionnaire developed and distributed by the project team requesting basic non-confidential information on their organizations, characteristics of their bioalcohol process technologies, and their technology development status and future plans. Some survey respondents indicated they were not presently active in this field or that their technology development did not involve a complete process for producing an alcohol fuel from cellulosic biomass. A few organizations declined to respond to the survey and others indicated they prefer to keep most or all of their development progress confidential. Therefore, additional sources of information were used to supplement the survey, including websites, papers and presentations and direct contacts. Only publicly-releasable information supplied by technology developers or otherwise found in the public domain was used to compile these profiles. For the most part, the information is exactly as reported by the development organizations, with no attempt by the project team to screen or substantiate this developer-specific information. Following in this appendix are profiles of 38 organizations that were found to be actively engaged in the development of a cellulosic biomass-to-alcohol production process. These profiles are grouped in various technology categories previously described in the report (and summarized in Table 1, page 9). Of the organizations listed, 26 are headquartered in the U.S., 5 in Canada, 2 in Brazil, and one each in Sweden, Germany, Spain, Denmark and Japan. This list is believed to include most of the noteworthy entities currently active in this field, especially in the U.S. and Canada. However, there may very well be other organizations, especially outside North America, engaged in bioalcohol process development. There are also many other organizations (not listed) pursuing development of related components of bioalcohol production technologies, such as enzyme development for biochemical processes, catalyst development for thermochemical processes, etc. 62
CATEGORY 1–THERMOCHEMICAL PROCESSES INCORPORATING PYROLYSIS/STEAM REFORMING WITHOUT OXYGEN Nova Fuels, Fresno, California Organizational Background–Nova Fuels is an independent technology innovation company pursuing development and commercialization of a biomass-to-alcohol fuel process designed to produce a mixed alcohol product called Novahol. Technology Characteristics–The Nova Fuels technology uses a thermochemical steam reforming processes to produce syngas. Biomass is ground to 1”-2” and injected into the pyrolysis/steam reformer using a screw auger. Appropriate feedstocks can include wood waste, agricultural waste, sorted municipal solid waste, and other clean carbon sources. This process is illustrated in Figure A1. The gasifier and its steam reforming section are a proprietary design of Nova Fuels and can be sized for different feedstock rates. Due to the presence of the 1500º F superheated steam in the reactor vessel, the Nova Fuels system provides both a long residence time and little opportunity for fouling the reactor internals with tar. Catalysts will be used to convert the syngas to a mixture of alcohols, consisting primarily of methanol and ethanol and traces of propanol, butanol and pentanol. Nova Fuels believes that they have carried out enough engineering and modeling work to proceed directly to commercial scale development. They have designed their thermochemical conversion systems to convert 250 DTPD of biomass feedstock to syngas. Development Status–Nova Fuels is currently engineering a commercial scale facility, having opted to bypass the demonstration phase. The end product of the catalytic process is Novahol which is made up of a range of fuel alcohols and can, if necessary, be refined to pure ethanol, propanol, butanol, or pentanol. Novahol, said to have an octane rating of 120, could also potentially be used as a fuel by itself, as an oxygenator for gasoline and diesel fuels (including biodiesel), and as an octane booster for gasoline. Nova Fuels is anticipating that the US EPA and CARB will ultimately approve this alcohol mixture as a gasoline additive. Future Plans–Nova Fuels is planning to build its first commercial facility at a site in Medical Lake, WA. This plant is intended to employ 8 of Nova Fuels’ nominal size processing modules for a total processing capacity of 2000 tons per day of biomass materials. Most of the feedstock will be wheat straw, supplemented by material from paper and lumber mills. The company has also been exploring potential projects in California and elsewhere. 63
Page 1 and 2:
Northern California Rice field Asse
Page 3 and 4:
APPENDIX 1. TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPER PR
Page 5 and 6:
LIST OF TABLES Table 1-Categories o
Page 7 and 8:
INTRODUCTION The State of Californi
Page 9 and 10:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This report provi
Page 11 and 12:
distributed production of bioalcoho
Page 13 and 14:
from corn, sugarcane and other suga
Page 15 and 16:
Table 1-Categories of Biomass Conve
Page 17 and 18: SECTION 2 - PAST CALIFORNIA BIOMASS
Page 19 and 20: the technological approach was too
Page 21 and 22: conversion technology at NREL, prep
Page 23 and 24: will use matching funds from the U.
Page 25 and 26: Report: Feasibility Study for Rice
Page 27 and 28: Environmental issues Market issues
Page 29 and 30: Presentation: Collins Pine Cogenera
Page 31 and 32: Syngas Production The thermochemica
Page 33 and 34: Alcohol Synthesis The direct synthe
Page 35 and 36: SECTION 4 - BIOCHEMICAL TECHNOLOGIE
Page 37 and 38: Feedstock Pretreatment There are a
Page 39 and 40: Achieving such cost reductions woul
Page 41 and 42: Another novel approach to bioalcoho
Page 43 and 44: have been run for a sufficient time
Page 45 and 46: concerns. This evaluation determine
Page 47 and 48: The data in Table 5 are based upon
Page 49 and 50: Thermochemical System (Electricity)
Page 51 and 52: SECTION 8 - OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALL
Page 53 and 54: For all of the biomass resource cat
Page 55 and 56: The above CEC and CBC inventories o
Page 57 and 58: Economic and Institutional Challeng
Page 59 and 60: SECTION 9 - GOVERNMENT ROLES AND IN
Page 61 and 62: SECTION 10 - CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMM
Page 63 and 64: initial attractive application may
Page 65 and 66: SECTION 11 - REFERENCES Barrett, J.
Page 67: Collaborative, California Energy Co
Page 71 and 72: and CO at the compression stage. Th
Page 73 and 74: Range Fuels, Inc., Denver, Colorado
Page 75 and 76: CATEGORY II-THERMOCHEMICAL PROCESSE
Page 77 and 78: Figure A4. Enerkem Process Diagram
Page 79 and 80: The slag leaves the gasifier and is
Page 81 and 82: Figure A6. Thermogenics, Inc., Tech
Page 83 and 84: CATEGORY VIII-BIOCHEMICAL PROCESSES
Page 85 and 86: Figure A8. BlueFire Arkenol Technol
Page 87 and 88: Figure A9. BEI Process Celunol Corp
Page 89 and 90: support systems and using the conve
Page 91 and 92: several years ago, HFTA has been wi
Page 93 and 94: Figure A11. Losonoco Wood-to-Ethano
Page 95 and 96: OxyNol process. TVA is decommission
Page 97 and 98: Technology Characteristics-The biom
Page 99 and 100: Figure A14. PEC Biomass-to-Ethanol
Page 101 and 102: CATEGORY IX - BIOCHEMICAL PROCESSES
Page 103 and 104: Richland Washington, with U.S. DOE
Page 105 and 106: construction of which could begin i
Page 107 and 108: Figure A16. Iogen Biomass-to-Ethano
Page 109 and 110: commercialize a biomass-to-ethanol
Page 111 and 112: developed by CBE, is used to separa
Page 113 and 114: Figure A19. DuPont Process BioGasol
Page 115 and 116: Technology Characteristics-The Swan
Page 117 and 118: CATEGORY X-OTHER BIOLOGICAL PROCESS
Page 119 and 120:
CATEGORY XI-INTEGRATED BIOREFINERY
Page 121 and 122:
CATEGORY XII-FERMENTATION OF SYNGAS
Page 123 and 124:
APPENDIX 2. CALIFORNIA ETHANOL PROD
Page 125:
Proposed Advanced Technology (Cellu
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