RICE ENERGY:
Bio-based Chemicals and Fuels


Life cycle assessment  --  Computational approaches --  Policy analysis --  Carbon cycle assessment  --  Biobutanol   --   Glycerol fermentation  --   Cellulosic biomass   --  Catalysis  --   Process design  --  Reactor design  --  Biodiesel kinetics   

By conservative estimates, biomass (plants, agricultural and other waste) can provide up to 25% of energy demands within the next 20 years. Yet much more research is needed to develop optimized fermentation or thermo-chemical processes.  A major objective is development of highly-integrated processes and biorefineries able to convert biomass to biofuels and bio-based chemicals using efficient, sustainable, environmentally benign, and economical production methods. The conversion of biomass to fuels and chemicals will parallel the route currently used by the petrochemical industry.

What Are the Key Strategies?
Several reports issued by the National Research Council, the Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, and other federal agencies and professional organizations have outlined three main research thrusts (or platforms) for the biomass effort. The main objective of all three platforms is the development of commercial biorefinery technology that can reduce (or even end) our dependence on foreign oil.

1. The sugar platform is based on extracting sugars from plant biomass and using them as substrates (feedstocks) for the production of fuels and chemicals, predominantly via fermentation processes. Enzymatic and chemical processes will also be components of this effort. This is the platform that includes cellulosic ethanol that has recently received so much attention in the press.
2. The syngas platform proposes to process the plant biomass thermally (pyrolysis/combustion) to obtain heat, power and a gas mix (syngas or synthesis gas) containing CO, CO₂, H₂, and other compounds. Syngas will then be processed via various chemical or fermentation routes to produce ethanol and other chemicals.
3. The oil platform is closely related to biodiesel or bio-distillate production. The goal here is to first extract the oil portion of an oil-accumulating plant (e.g., soybean or rapeseed) and then either use this oil to produce biodiesel (a mixture of fatty acid methyl esters) or process it into bio-distillates via conventional refinery technology. Unlike the extraction of sugars, the extraction of biomass oils is technically simple and the subsequent production of methyl esters is a highly efficient process. The rapidly growing biodiesel industry, however, will flood the US and international markets with glycerol, a significant co-product of biodiesel and oleochemical production. For this reason, research into the conversion of glycerin into other useful products (like ethanol, other chemicals or hydrogen) has the potential to revolutionize this industry and dramatically improve its economics.

What can Rice contribute to the development of this industry?
Rice is well positioned to become a key player in the development of bio-refinery technology.

• The university is located in Houston, the energy capital of the world, and most petrochemical companies have research and/or production facilities in our area.
• As these energy companies move aggressively into biofuels and bio-based chemicals (see, for example, recent announcements by BP and Chevron), they will want to leverage their existing production and distribution infrastructure.
• Rice has several interdisciplinary groups working on cross-cutting, enabling technologies across all three platforms. Collaborative research efforts between faculty in the engineering and science schools and their colleagues in the Baker Institute and the social

Faculty

Pedro Alvarez
Andrew Barron
George Bennett
Janet Braam
Steven Cox
Ramon Gonzalez
Nikolaos Mantzaris
Ka-Yiu San
Michael Wong
Kyriacos Zygourakis

Student Organizations

RUBI
(Rice BioDiesel Initiative)

Engineers without Borders