US-based Terrabon has produced high-octane "green gasoline" made from non-food biomass. The gasoline was produced using Terrabon's licensed MixAlco technology to pre-treat and ferment biomass at Terrabon's biofuels research plant, Energy Independence I. The plant is situated in Bryan, Texas. The Terrabon's licensed MixAlco technology process yielded organic salts, which were converted to ketones and then to high-octane gasoline.
Gary W. Luce, chief executive officer of Terrabon, said: “The production of green gasoline is the culmination of 15 years of research and testing by our team.
“It is an important milestone both for Terrabon and for the development of renewable energy resources that can lower our nation’s dependence on fossil fuels. With the successful production of green gasoline, Terrabon has taken the technology risk off the table, and we can now intensify our focus on the engineering issues of improving yield and purity across each step of the process.”
The company, with the Department of Energy, has applied for a $25m grant to build and operate a 55-ton per day bio-refinery in Port Arthur, Texas, with an annual production of 1.3 million gallons of green gasoline at Valero Energy Corporation’s refinery. The construction work at the plant is expected to start in the first quarter of 2010 and its operations are scheduled in the second half of 2011. It has also applied for funding through the Texas Emerging Technology Fund to support the conversion of municipal solid waste (MSW) to green gasoline.
MixAlco technology, an advanced bio-refining process, converts non-food, non-sterile biomass into transportation fuels. In this process, the biomass that may be used as feedstock includes forest-product residues such as wood chips, wood molasses and other wood waste, MSW, sewage sludge, and non-edible energy crops such as the sorghum used at Energy Independence I. The company expects that the capital costs for MixAlco plants would be less than that of other technologies. The company’s MixAlco technology is expected to produce 5.5 million gallons per year of renewable gasoline for approximately $1.75 to $2.00 per gallon.
Cesar B. Granda, chief technology officer of Terrabon’s, said: “Some time ago, we proved in the laboratory and at our pilot plant that the MixAlco technology could be used to convert biomass into chemicals that can be processed into gasoline. We have now proven that the MixAlco technology can be used to produce gasoline on a commercial scale. Our fuel has a very similar distillation profile to gasoline produced in a refinery from the fluid catalytic cracker (FCC) unit, which represents about 40% of U.S. gasoline supply. However, this green gasoline has important advantages in that its sulfur content is four times lower than hydro processed FCC gasoline and the octane rating is much higher.”
The company holds the worldwide license from the Texas A&M University System related to this technology and intends to license and joint venture MixAlco with companies that control existing infrastructure for biomass collection and transportation. The MixAlco technology was developed by Mark T. Holtzapple and Granda at Texas A&M University.
Terrabon was formed to commercialize three technologies that are developed at and exclusively licensed to the company by Texas A&M University , which are planned to be deployed through licensing and joint venture arrangements. Its MixAlco technology converts biomass to green gasoline. AdVE is a water desalination process that utilizes vapor-compression evaporation to desalinate salt water into potable water. SoluPro is a bioproducts process that converts inexpensive protein-bearing waste material into animal feed and “green” commercial adhesives.