Many organisations are developing biofuels to replace gasoline, but most of them use food crops. Australian scientists have made a biofuel from forest and garden waste.
Many organisations are developing biofuels – renewable fuels to replace gasoline. But most of them convert food stuffs into ethanol. Australian scientists have converted forest and garden waste into fuel.
Dr Steven Loffler of the CSIRO’s Energy Transformed division and colleagues at Melbourne’s Monash University, have developed a process that converts green waste -- which would otherwise be buried or burned -- into a crude biofuel.
The Furafuel Process creates a stable bio-crude oil from lignocellulose found in green waste such as waste paper and garden waste
This biocrude oil can then be further refined to produce high value chemicals and biofuels, including both petrol and diesel replacement fuels.
The technology makes it economical to produce this biocrude in local areas for transport to a central biorefinery, rather than transporting the bulky green waste to the refinery.
Speaking on a CSIRO podcast, Dr Loffler said that by making changes to the chemical process of breaking down the constituents of plant-based waste, “we’ve been able to create a concentrated bio-crude which is much more stable than that achieved elsewhere in the world,”
“This makes it practical and economical to produce bio-crude in local areas for transport to a central refinery, overcoming the high costs and greenhouse gas emissions otherwise involved in transporting bulky green wastes over long distances.”
Fuel From Tree Thinnings and Garden Waste
The process uses a range of low-value paper and wood products such as forest thinnings, crop residues, waste paper and garden waste. Most of these are either burned, sending more CO2 into the atmosphere, or are buried in landfill.
These plant-based waste items all contain a group of chemicals, lignocelluloses, which Dr Loffler says are increasingly favoured around the world as a raw material for the next generation of bio-ethanol.
“Lignocellulose is both renewable and potentially greenhouse gas neutral. It is predominantly found in trees and is made up of cellulose; lignin, a natural plastic; and hemicellulose,” he said.
Biofuel Produces Energy, Reduces Emissions
Creating a biofuel from lignocellulose is a win-win situation for the environment. Fuel is created from waste, which would otherwise produce CO2 emissions from being burnt or would take up landfill space. At the same time, it’s a renewable energy source that, unlike most, is not based on a food crop.
“By using waste, our Furafuel technology overcomes the food versus fuel debate which surrounds biofuels generated from grains, corn and sugar,” said Dr Loffler.
“The project forms part of CSIRO’s commitment to delivering cleaner energy and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by improving technologies for converting waste biomass to transport fuels.”
Once laboratory trials of the biocrude are completed, CSIRO and Monash will patent the chemical process of converting green waste to biofuel.
Lignocellulose Key to Plant-based Ethanol
Both the CSIRO's Furafuel process and another biofuels process being trialed by American researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst catalyse lignocelluloses from plant waste to produce ethanol.
Wood and grass are the raw ingredients for a different method of producing biofuels called catalytic fast pyrolysis, developed by Dr George Huber of the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Dr Huber, a professor of chemical engineering, has received a $400,000 grant from the US National Science Foundation to continue his research into the process An initial report was published in the April 2008 issue of ChemSusChem, a publication devoted to environmentally-sound chemistry.
