Thermochemical conversion of biomass and organic wastes into renewable fuels and high value co-products

摘要

My primary research interest is in the generation of alternative fuels and co-products from biomass and wastes via thermochemical conversion (TCC) routes and catalysis. Pyrolysis and hydrothermal liquefaction are two important TCC processes that convert biomass components into a liquid fuel (called, bio-oil or biocrude) in a single step. Bio-oil can be catalytically modified and co-processed into hydrocarbon fuels in the presence of hydrogen and co-solvents. Integration of a ‘well defined’ TCC process with a suitable low-cost catalytic method is important for production of commodity biofuels (gasoline/diesel). Co-product development and utilization in biomass processing has significance to the process sustainability and cost-economics. My research interests are in developing new processes and optimizing process parameters to maximize the primary fuel production (example, bio-oil) and co-product utilization. For example, in hydrothermal liquefaction and carbonization processes, the aqueous co-product streams have significant amounts of organics and nutrients that can be separated: the nutrients can be reused and recycled for plant growth, and the organics can be catalytically upgraded into high-value chemicals (levoglucosans, sugars, hydroxymethyl furfurals etc.), or converted into energy-dense gases via hydrothermal gasification process.