Newsletter Archive

As part of the Biomass Research and Development Act of 2000, the Biomass Initiative calls upon the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to issue joint solicitations on biomass R&D. This article will provide an update on the status of projects funded by the DOE and the USDA in 2002, the first year in which the agencies selected R&D projects under the Initiative. Both the departments contributed FY 2002 dollars to fund eight projects. The DOE funded six projects through its Integrated Biomass Solicitation held to meet the goal of conducting R&D focused on concepts that would integrate the production of biomass-derived fuels and other products into economical and sustainable industrial biorefineries. The USDA selected two projects submitted through the solicitation in cooperation with the DOE.

As the FY 2002 joint solicitation projects begin their third year of work, they enter a phase where significant accomplishments have been made. As a result, at the end of FY 2004, the Biomass R&D Technical Advisory Committee asked for an update on each of these projects’ status. The Committee was presented with the same on March 17, 2005. The following provides a summary of the update for each project.

1. "A Second Generation Dry Mill Biorefinery" – Broin and Associates, Inc. in partnership with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and South Dakota State University

   Project Start Date: January 2003

   Project Objective: The goal of the project is to improve the economics of existing dry mills by adding additional co-products and increasing ethanol yields.

   Project Status Update: Using proprietary processes and equipment, Broin’s second generation dry mill will fractionate incoming corn feed’s bran, germ, and endosperm to enable flexibility in feedstock utilization, substrate conversion, and fermentation processes while allowing for expanded co-product formation. At bench- and pilot-scale, Broin and NREL will investigate the technical and economic feasibility of converting hemicellulose and cellulose fractions of the extracted corn bran into ethanol. The bran and endosperm residues will also be tested for ability to be converted to high-value animal feeds. Since the project’s beginning, approximately 66 percent of the $5.5 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments to date include the use of corn bran in a bench-scale fermentation to demonstrate increased ethanol production, a completed retrofit of the fractionation facility, and the permits obtained to install the pilot-scale fermentation facility.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: Processing and Conversion, Biorefinery Integration

2. "New Biorefinery Platform Intermediate Project" – Cargill Inc. in partnership with Codexis, Inc., Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL)

   Project Start Date: May 2003

   Project Objective: To develop a new bio-based platform technology that produces an array of products based on 3-HP produced by the fermentation of carbohydrates.

   Project Status Update: This project aims to, through the fermentation of carbohydrates to make 3-HP, generate important chemicals such as acrylic acid, 1,3-propanediol, and plastics. In order to develop an effective fermentation organism and process for 3-HP production, Cargill will work to optimize organisms for efficient industrial-scale production and to develop a viable catalyst for downstream conversion of 3-HP to valuable products. Eventually, Cargill hopes to finalize a process design that will be suitable for pilot testing and industrial production. Since the project’s beginning, approximately 33 percent of the $6 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments to date include the selection of a suitable strand; the identification of reactor configuration, catalyst, and operating conditions; the successful development of the enzyme assay and the demonstration of enzyme production; and the improvement of the key enzyme in the 3-HP pathway.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: Processing and Conversion, Biorefinery Integration

3. "Making the Industrial Biorefinery Happen" – Nature Works, LLC in partnership with Genencor and Iogen

   Project Start Date: January 2003

   Project Objective: To develop and validate process technology for use with sustainable agricultural systems that economically produce sugars and chemicals such as lactic acid and ethanol.

   Project Status Update: Nature Works is working in partnership to assemble each element of the biomass conversion process into an integrated and pilot-validated package that is ready for commercial implementation in a biorefinery. Specifically, Nature Works will enable the use of lignocellulosic biomass for conversion into lactic acid and ethanol. This will be achieved through six steps: 1) the development of metabolic engineering tools; 2) the testing of organisms in an alpha-phase pilot-scale fermentation and the completion of pilot plant engineering; 3) the development of a fermentation organism for biomass sugar conversion; 4) the start-up of a pilot plant and validation of the commercial-scale design; 5) selection of the final fermentation organism that meets performance targets; and 6) completion of the beta-phase pilot fermentation. Since the project’s beginning, approximately 36 percent of the $26 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments to date include the completion of economic feasibility modeling and development of initial process flow diagrams; the development of improved strains; assessment of the strain baseline and the development of advanced experimental tools, resulting in superior strains compared to the latest published in literature studies; construction of the fermentation system and the beginning of fermentation; and the completion of the second-generation strain.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: Processing and Conversion, Biorefinery Integration

4. "Integrated Corn-Based Biorefinery Project (ICBR)" – DuPont in partnership with Diversa, NREL, and Michigan State University

   Project Start Date: April 2003

   Project Objective: To develop the integrated corn-based biorefinery for the parallel production of fuel ethanol and 1,3 propanediol (PDO).

   Project Status Update: The purpose of the ICBR is to demonstrate the practicality of producing alternative fuels and chemicals from renewable resources. To do so, the ICBR process uses a new technology to convert corn grain and stover (current practice uses only corn grain) into fermentable sugars that can then be converted to multiple value-added chemicals within the biorefinery. A major focus of the project is to overcome pretreatment issues when dealing with corn stover. Since the project’s beginning, approximately 55 percent of the $18.1 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments include: completion of an economic study to show the production of PDO in an integrated biorefinery had a significantly higher return on investment than the biological production in a non-integrated facility and from a petroleum refinery; the formation of a joint venture between DuPont and Tate & Lyle to produce PDO biologically from wet mill-derived glucose; the completion of a benchmark ASPEN model for both production of a value-added chemical from corn grain and ethanol from corn stover; and the completion of the subcloning of endoglucanases and the characterization of 70 percent of the subclones.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: Processing and Conversion, Biorefinery Integration

5. "Advanced Biorefining of Distiller’s Grain and Corn Stover Blends" – Abengoa Bioenergy LLC in partnership with NREL, Novozymes NA, Inc., and VTT – Finland

   Project Start Date: January 2003

   Project Objective: To develop a novel biomass-derived process technology that utilizes advanced biorefined distiller’s grains and corn stover blends to achieve higher ethanol yields in a dry mill.

   Project Status Update: Through bench- and pilot-scale demonstrations, this project will develop a viable pretreatment process for distiller’s grains and corn stover to produce ethanol and high-protein feed. The project goals will be achieved in two phases. First, alcohol yields will be increased and feed product quality improved through residual starch conversion. Second, distiller’s grains and corn stover will be converted to a substrate suitable for alcohol production. The project will result in a biomass fractionation technology for the production of ethanol and high-value co-products that can be readily integrated into existing dry mills. Since the project’s beginning, approximately 32 percent of the $17.7 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments to date include troubleshooting and base line runs for the dry mill portion of the pilot plant; the completion of over a dozen milestones and deliverables in the first quarter of FY 2005; and the demonstration of a reduction in residual starch and an increase in the overall yield of ethanol through bench-scale pretreatment and fermentation processing.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: Processing and Conversion, Biorefinery Integration

6. "Separation of Corn Fiber and Conversion to Fuels and Chemicals" – National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) in partnership with PNNL and Archer Daniels Midland, Co.

   Project Start Date: October 2002

   Project Objective: To economically derive high-value chemicals and oils from corn fiber.

   Project Status Update: In order to meet the project objective, this project will develop an integrated process for the separation of corn fiber into its principal components to produce chemicals and ethanol. The project will also develop novel integrated separation and processing strategies that utilize hydrolysis and extraction methods. The process being developed involves the conversion of starch into glucose to make ethanol; the hydrolysis of the hemicellulose fraction to yield 5-carbon sugars, arabinose, and xylose; the conversion of xylose to ethanol and arabinose to ethylene glycol, propylene glycol, and glycerol; and the recovery of high-value oil components, sterols, and stanols. Since the project’s beginning, approximately 46 percent of the $2.4 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments to date include the decision to continue with pilot-scale testing and the project’s leading to a secondary project that could potentially result in a major breakthrough in biodiesel production.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: Processing and Conversion, Biorefinery Integration

For more information on these projects, please refer to the project fact sheets located on the DOE Office of the Biomass Program website at http://www.eere.energy.gov/biomass/project_factsheets.html.

1. "Value-Added Products from Hemicellulose Utilization in Dry Mill Ethanol Plants" - Iowa Corn Promotion Board in partnership with Minnesota Corn Research and Promotion Council, Ohio Corn Marketing Program, PNNL, and the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL)

   Project Start Date: January 2003

   Project Objective: To integrate enzymatic hydrolysis, fermentation and aqueous phase catalysis that produce high-value components from hemicellulose.

   Project Status Update: Since the project’s beginning, 100 percent of the $2 million requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments include the identification of the best strain and the beginning of the genetic engineering of the strain.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: This project crosscuts several Roadmap categories.

2. "Continuous Isosorbide Production from Sorbitol Using Solid Acid Catalysis" – Iowa Corn Promotion Board in partnership with PNNL and Archer Daniels Midland, Co.

   Project Start Date: January 2003

   Project Objective: To establish the conceptual process flow diagrams, material and energy balances, capital estimates and operating costs for the conversion of sorbitol to isosorbide via pilot plant operations.

   Project Status Update: Since the project’s beginning, 100 percent of the $700,000 requested for the project has been obligated. Major accomplishments include the modification of the PNNL continuous reactor; the assessment of the viability of the PNNL process; and the completed study of various solid acids in the reactor.

   Roadmap Category Addressed by Project: This project crosscuts several Roadmap categories.

In 2000, the state of New Hampshire consumed approximately 370 trillion Btu of energy. Petroleum accounted for the majority of the energy consumption, generating approximately 48 percent of all energy used. Nuclear energy supplied the second-most amount of the energy consumed, accounting for roughly 25 percent of the total, followed by coal and natural gas at 11 and 7 percent respectively. With hydroelectric supplying 3 percent of the total energy consumed in 2000, the remaining 6 percent of the energy was taken care of by biomass.¹

New Hampshire has the potential to use four of the five main categories of biomass to generate energy. An estimated 2.9 billion kWh of electricity could be generated using renewable biomass fuels in New Hampshire. This is enough electricity to fully supply the annual needs of 293,000 average homes, or 87 percent of the residential electricity use in New Hampshire. Mill residues create the most amount of material available for energy generation, with an estimated 1,109,000 dry tons available per year. The estimated supplies of forest and urban residues available for energy generation are 564,000 and 184,000 dry tons per year respectively. No agricultural residues are availale for energy generation in New Hampshire, while energy crops could potentially supply 159,000 dry tons per year.²

Renewable energy programs in New Hampshire are managed by the New Hampshire Office of Energy and Planning (OEP). A recently completed biomass project is the Bio-Oil Opportunity Analysis. In coordination with the New Hampshire Department of Resources and Economic Development (DRED), OEP recently conducted a study that determined the economic, environmental, and technical feasibility of establishing a bio-oil (or oil produced by wood-waste through pyrolysis) production and utilization industry in the state. The final report was issued in September 2004.³

Mainstay Energy is a private company offering customers who install or have installed renewable energy systems the opportunity to sell the green tags associated with the energy generated by these systems. Through the Mainstay Energy Rewards Program, participating customers in New England receive either quarterly production-based payments or an up-front payment. The state of New Hampshire does not currently participate in any other state-sponsored financial or policy incentive programs.⁴