Techno-economic assessment of integrating methanol or Fischer–Tropsch synthesis in a South African sugar mill

Petersen, Abdul M.; Farzad, Somayeh; Görgens, Johann F.

doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2015.02.007

Cited by 46 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…Allothermal gasification (ALO-G) was modelled for syngas production from sugarcane lignocelluloses [85], in which the heat for the endothermic gasification reactions was assumed to be supplied by a heat transfer medium, such as a bed material circulated between combustion and gasification chambers in a dual fluidised bed gasifier [86–88]. The gasification conditions for very low-tar syngas production were simulated [85].…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multi-product biorefineries from lignocelluloses: a pathway to revitalisation of the sugar industry?

Farzad

Mandegari

Guo

et al. 2017

Biotechnol Biofuels

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164

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BackgroundDriven by a range of sustainability challenges, e.g. climate change, resource depletion and expanding populations, a circular bioeconomy is emerging and expected to evolve progressively in the coming decades. South Africa along with other BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) represents the emerging bioeconomy and contributes significantly to global sugar market. In our research, South Africa is used as a case study to demonstrate the sustainable design for the future biorefineries annexed to existing sugar industry. Detailed techno-economic evaluation and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) were applied to model alternative routes for converting sugarcane residues (bagasse and trash) to selected biofuel and/or biochemicals (ethanol, ethanol and lactic acid, ethanol and furfural, butanol, methanol and Fischer–Tropsch synthesis, with co-production of surplus electricity) in an energy self-sufficient biorefinery system.ResultsEconomic assessment indicated that methanol synthesis with an internal rate of return (IRR) of 16.7% and ethanol–lactic acid co-production (20.5%) met the minimum investment criteria of 15%, while the latter had the lowest sensitivity to market price amongst all the scenarios. LCA results demonstrated that sugarcane cultivation was the most significant contributor to environmental impacts in all of the scenarios, other than the furfural production scenario in which a key step, a biphasic process with tetrahydrofuran solvent, had the most significant contribution.ConclusionOverall, the thermochemical routes presented environmental advantages over biochemical pathways on most of the impact categories, except for acidification and eutrophication. Of the investigated scenarios, furfural production delivered the inferior environmental performance, while methanol production performed best due to its low reagent consumption. The combined techno-economic and environmental assessments identified the performance-limiting steps in the 2G biorefinery design for sugarcane industry and highlighted the technology development opportunities under circular bioeconomy context.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13068-017-0761-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorised users.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multi-product biorefineries from lignocelluloses: a pathway to revitalisation of the sugar industry?

Farzad

Mandegari

Guo

et al. 2017

Biotechnol Biofuels

Self Cite

164

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“…Furthermore, investigations by Petersen et al (2015) and Farzad et al (2017b) proved that calculated MeOH production cost was 30% higher than its then market price. Petersen et al (2015) and Farzad et al (2017b) also investigated MeOH production annexed to a sugar mill. All these studies demonstrated that MeOH producing scenarios from sugarcane residues are not likely to be economically feasible under the current economic conditions (low oil price), without government subsidies (Albarelli et al, 2015).…”

Section: Methanolmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…Albarelli et al (2015) evaluated a sugarcane biorefinery producing EtOH through juice fermentation and MeOH via gasification of sugarcane lignocellulosic residues and liquid fuel synthesis. The cost analysis showed that the A sugar mill with an annexed 2G biorefinery has been investigated for methanol, FT syncrude, and bio oil production (Nsaful et al, 2013;Petersen et al, 2015), which showed that the combustion of biomass and electricity production was a more attractive option than applying a pyrolysis plant considering the current pyrolysis technology (Nsaful et al, 2013). Furthermore, investigations by Petersen et al (2015) and Farzad et al (2017b) proved that calculated MeOH production cost was 30% higher than its then market price.…”

Section: Methanolmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The cost analysis showed that the A sugar mill with an annexed 2G biorefinery has been investigated for methanol, FT syncrude, and bio oil production (Nsaful et al, 2013;Petersen et al, 2015), which showed that the combustion of biomass and electricity production was a more attractive option than applying a pyrolysis plant considering the current pyrolysis technology (Nsaful et al, 2013). Furthermore, investigations by Petersen et al (2015) and Farzad et al (2017b) proved that calculated MeOH production cost was 30% higher than its then market price. Petersen et al (2015) and Farzad et al (2017b) also investigated MeOH production annexed to a sugar mill.…”

Section: Methanolmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Recent trends on techno-economic assessment (TEA) of sugarcane biorefineries

2017

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“…This is especially critical to the countries with rich resources to adjust their exporting product categories [9,10]. One of core technologies of GTL is the FischerTropsch synthesis (FTS) process [11], and it has been commercialized on a large scale by many different companies. The tubular fixed-bed reactors (TFBR) FTS were first commercialized by Sasol in South Africa using iron catalyst since the 1950s [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Performance Study of stirred tank slurry reactor and fixed‐bed reactor using bimetallic Co–Ni mesoporous silica catalyst for fischer–tropsch synthesis

Sun

Yang²,

Sun

et al. 2017

Env Prog and Sustain Energy

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The Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FTS) was studied using mesoporous silica-supported bimetallic Co-Ni catalyst in a fixed-bed reactor (FBR) and a slurry continuously stirred tank reactor (CSTR) under different temperatures (from 2808C to 3008C) with syngas ratio of 2 and a total pressure of 3.5 MPa. The activity of the catalyst was higher in FBR due to complete reduction. The CSTR was found to experience a less degree of catalyst deactivation, and its CO conversion was more sensitive in responding to the variation of temperatures because of its better temperature control. The intraparticle diffusion limitation was much improved in the CSTR system due to employment of smaller particle size of the catalyst. The selectivity of gasoline fraction (C 5 -C 13 ) was higher in CSTR system than that in FBR at the same baseline condition. The appreciable increases of selectivity in CO 2 , methane, and longer-chain hydrocarbon were observed in FBR when the comparable CO conversion was set for comparison between FBR and CSTR. Reducing the particle size of the catalyst was more effective in increasing the selectivity of lighter (C 2 -C 6 ) 1-olefin in CSTR system. The FBR produced higher selectivity of longer chain (C 7 1) 1-olefin.

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Techno-economic assessment of integrating methanol or Fischer–Tropsch synthesis in a South African sugar mill

Cited by 46 publications

References 20 publications

Multi-product biorefineries from lignocelluloses: a pathway to revitalisation of the sugar industry?

Multi-product biorefineries from lignocelluloses: a pathway to revitalisation of the sugar industry?

Recent trends on techno-economic assessment (TEA) of sugarcane biorefineries

Performance Study of stirred tank slurry reactor and fixed‐bed reactor using bimetallic Co–Ni mesoporous silica catalyst for fischer–tropsch synthesis

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