Catalytic fast pyrolysis (CFP) shows promise as an approach to producing renewable liquid transportation fuels, and even though it is cheaper than many conversion technologies, best estimates suggest that the cost of the final fuel will still be much higher than current gasoline or diesel fuel prices. In order to become more cost-competitive, it is increasingly clear that biorefineries will need to produce value-added co-products that can increase their revenues so that they can sell inexpensive fuel. With this realization, we have been investigating the co-production of chemicals and materials from CFP and will discuss some of the results from these studies. Four approaches are currently being investigated; 1) utilizing organic compounds found in CFP aqueous streams, 2) extracting valuable chemicals from CFP oils, 3) funneling of the vapors from lignin pyrolysis into phenolics using partial oxidation and 4) converting the distillation residuals from CFP oils into high value advanced carbon. The aqueous streams from CFP can contain high levels of organic molecules (3 – 15%), which must be removed before the water can be discharged. The expense for treating the water (usually with thermal oxidation) can be avoided if these organics can be removed and often these oxygenated species are of high value. We have separated organic compounds from CFP aqueous product and have compared resins made from the phenolics in these mixture to petroleum sourced resins. Similarly, phenolics and cyclic ketones have been isolated from the CFP oil for use as resins or polymers. Removing these compounds from the oil may avoid the high cost of hydrotreating to make hydrocarbon fuels and utilizes the unique functionality of biomass products to prepare polymers and resins that are expensive and energy intensive to prepare from petroleum. Likewise, phenolic compounds can be made by partially oxidizing the side chains from the pyrolysis products from lignin. We have been investigating using vanadium clusters to funnel these products into simple phenolics. Finally, the high molecular weight materials that remain after distillation of CFP oils have been calcined and graphitized and have been tested as anode material in lithium ion batteries. Results from these experiments have shown that chemical co-products can indeed beneficially impact the cost of biofuels produced by CFP.<br/>

Catalytic fast pyrolysis for chemicals and materials

256th National Meeting (2018)

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