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U.S. researchers have recently developed new gasification methods and created new gasification reactors. When they significantly increase the efficiency of converting biomass raw materials into biofuels, they also greatly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The relevant research is published in the latest Period of the United States "Technical Review" magazine.
Paul Dawnhaus, the head of the study, and the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, said that using the new method, they put precisely controlled amounts of carbon dioxide and methane on their own specially developed catalytic reactors. In the process, the biomass feedstock is gasified. As a result, the carbon in the biomass feedstock and methane is all converted to carbon monoxide, which is necessary for the production of biofuels. The new method is expected to improve within two years, which will be a major breakthrough in the conversion of biomass feedstocks into biofuels.
At present, through the gasification process, biomass raw materials are decomposed into carbon monoxide and hydrogen at a high temperature, and hydrogen can be made into various biofuels including various hydrocarbons. However, this process has a "hard wound": about half of the carbon in the biomass feedstock is converted to carbon dioxide instead of carbon monoxide.
The Dawnhouse team has made improvements to traditional technologies. In order to get more biofuel after gasification, the researchers added carbon dioxide to the reaction, allowing carbon dioxide and hydrogen to react to produce carbon monoxide and water. Increasing carbon dioxide is not enough to turn all the carbon in the biomass into carbon monoxide, and some carbon will still become carbon dioxide. Therefore, the researchers also added hydrogen in the reaction to provide the required energy to promote the reaction. The research team put the cheap and common methane in the reactor to “release†hydrogen.
In addition, in the traditional method, each individual step was completed in different chemical reactors, and the Donnehaus team concentrated all reactions in one reactor, significantly reducing the cost of the gasification process.
The research team intends to try commercialization near a natural gas power station that can provide enough methane and carbon dioxide.
However, "Technical Review" magazine pointed out that the process may not be suitable for commercialization. First, researchers need to demonstrate that this technology is equally applicable to biomass, not just cellulose extracted from biomass. Biomass contains a wide range of impurities that are not present in pure cellulose. It may have a negative impact on the catalyst, so researchers must modify the reactor. In addition, there are also challenges in allowing this process to be carried out on a large scale, including ensuring that heat can pass through the reactor, even though small-scale experiments have done so.
Dawnhaus said that these challenges are not worth mentioning compared with the breakthroughs made by its research institutes. If a company wants to develop this process, it will be able to reach a market within a few years.
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