Researchers of the University of Minnesota and the University of Massachusetts Amherst have found a novel method to produce sustainable fuel from biomass feedstock. Paul J. Dauenhauer from the chemical engineering department of the University of Massachusetts Amherst commented that the process of ‘gasification’ developed by the team decreases greenhouse gas emissions and doubles the quantity of fuel generated from 1 acre of biomass feedstock.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has published the explanation of the ‘gasification’ process in ‘Technology Review’. The process gasifies biomass in a catalytic reactor, which comprises controlled quantities of methane and carbon dioxide. The output from the process is carbon monoxide.

Paul opines that currently followed approaches convert feedstock into hydrogen and carbon monoxide, which in turn is made as fuels such as hydrocarbons. However, around 50% of the carbon gets converted into CO2 instead of CO. Hence, Paul and his team wanted to improve the technology.

So, in order to increase the gasification yields, the researchers incorporated carbon dioxide so as to produce carbon monoxide and water. However, it is also important to incorporate hydrogen, which partly helps in offering the energy required to run the reactions. In order to generate this valuable hydrogen, the novel gasification process utilizes methane.

A commercial-scale version of the novel gasification process can be installed close to a natural gas power plant facility, which can readily provide carbon dioxide and methane. However, the novel gasification process is still not ready for commercialization, as the researchers will have to exhibit that the process works with biomass and not merely with cellulose taken from biomass.

Source: http://www.umass.edu/