Mascoma is focusing on improving the first steps of the process--pretreating raw materials and converting cellulose into sugars--which South says are key to reducing costs. In the conventional pretreatment step, materials such as wood chips are soaked in a dilute solution of sulfuric acid and then heated. This breaks down complex lignin structures that form a "shield" around the cellulose, says Charles Wyman, Mascoma co-founder and professor of chemical and environmental engineering at the University of California, in Riverside. Wyman's research has analyzed the mechanisms involved in this process, helping the company optimize this step. Mascoma has also developed technology for improving the next step: breaking down the now accessible cellulose into sugars by using enzymes produced by organisms. In the latter part of the process, these sugars are fermented to make ethanol. Wyman estimates that the company's technology could produce ethanol for about the same cost as producing ethanol from corn, and eventually for less money. This would be a significant improvement over other technology. A cost analysis at an NREL pilot plant, for example, suggests that it would cost more than two dollars a gallon to make cellulosic ethanol--about double the cost of making corn ethanol. But even NREL researchers are confident that this cost will be cut in half and meet corn-ethanol costs within six years, Douglas says. Producing enough ethanol to replace a significant fraction of gasoline consumption is still many years away, however. It will require further improving both the technology and the industrial processes, including the challenges that go with handling large amounts of bulky biomass. "We are definitely not there yet," says MIT's Stephanopoulos. "Processes today are clearly uneconomical." But Douglas says researchers are optimistic that continued funding and the application of new tools will make widespread cellulosic ethanol possible: "The pathways are pretty clear." |
Audio »
Share »
Digg this
Add to del.icio.us
Add to Reddit
Add to Facebook
Slashdot It!
Stumble It!
Add to Newsvine
Add to Connotea
Add to CiteUlike
Add to Furl
Googlize this
Add to Rojo
Add to MyWeb
Favorite
Print
E-mail
Better Bug to Make Cellulosic Ethanol
09/09/2008
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Comments
dickcaro on 11/16/2006 at 8:59 AM
7
jpdemers on 11/17/2006 at 1:42 AM
34
Burning it, on the other hand, is not wasteful. Pulpwood forests are a renewable resource, so the CO2 that's generated is recycled back into more wood. Beats burning oil or gas in the same boiler.
Lambchop_ChemE on 12/31/2006 at 12:08 AM
1
Please include the words * Chemical engineering - ethanol * in the subject header.
Thanks.
Lambchop
cdlewis on 07/30/2007 at 2:11 AM
4
check out this company, dynamotive.com. they are successfully converting forestry wastes into bio-fuel. this shows more promise than ethanol.
cliff lewis, sappi fine paper, north america
protn7 on 11/22/2006 at 9:57 AM
39
If you are interested in a partnership contact Neil Farbstein, President of Vulvox Nano/biotechnology at protn7@att.net
jdrodrigu on 01/09/2007 at 4:45 PM
1
rockypatel123 on 07/23/2007 at 3:39 PM
1
Rocky
N O M on 04/17/2008 at 11:51 PM
9
fivedoughnut on 04/20/2008 at 8:00 PM
1
Neil Farbstein is emphatically and most unequivocally not a rancid distended crap-sack of duplicitous swindling double dealing defaecation. Furthermore, he's assuredly not a colossal foul jissom bucket of pumped-up delusional human excrement posing as a profoundly psychotic muttonhead.
[URL]http://www.physforum.com/index.php?showtopic=21242&st=105[/URL]
porosity on 12/27/2006 at 12:56 AM
3
m_albertson on 02/03/2007 at 3:47 PM
4
So far, the best site I've found is <a href="http://www.investincellulosicethanol.com"> www.InvestInCellulosicEthanol.com </a>.
jeanwilliam on 01/13/2008 at 11:52 PM
2
Daddeo01905 on 04/07/2007 at 5:54 PM
1
cdlewis on 10/29/2007 at 8:47 AM
4
Brian Maki on 12/17/2007 at 4:13 PM
1
jeanwilliam on 05/06/2008 at 1:49 AM
2