Mankato hosts international and local bioenergy companies in search of deal flow and market creation

Ames, Iowa (September 17, 2008) — Robert C. Brown is speaking at the International Bioenergy Days (IBED) traveling congress Sept. 28 – Oct. 3, 2008. Appearing for the first time in the U.S., IBED is an innovative congress designed to jump-start bioenergy commercialization and technology transfer initiatives between the U.S. and Sweden.

The congress begins at Minnesota State University, Mankato with exciting presentations from Will Steger and international experts in bioenergy programs. Through a unique company matchmaking system, demonstration of European bioheat technology not yet available in the U.S., and study tours, the congress aims to address the next generations of technology in numerous areas of biomass energy and renewable alternatives. The exhibit hall features more than 60 organizations and companies from Sweden, Norway, Ireland, and the U.S.

“IBED is about deal flow and market creation,” said Dale Wahlstrom, CEO of BioBusiness Alliance of Minnesota. “Sweden has perfected the company and community matchmaking process to create business relationships that have immediate applicability and mutual economic and social benefit. This congress dramatically speeds up the commercialization process and will likely result in realistic implementation strategies for communities and growth of new markets for clean and green product manufacturers.”

Technology demonstrations at the congress and the Oct. 1‐3 study tours throughout Minnesota will show participants examples of how the technology is applied. “IBED is not a traditional conference, it is a traveling conference. We are trying to highlight Minnesota as a state and to do so, participants of the conference need to see the state and view the different assets and companies that are leading Minnesota in our renewable energy efforts,” explained Bob Ryan, 2008 IBED Conference Chairman.

Additionally, on Sept. 29 Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak and St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman are inviting community leaders to a bioenergy community best practices workshop to learn from experts and each other on how to implement clean and green policies. Contact Amy Johnson to register for the community session (ajohnsonbiobusinessalliance.org).

We are honored to host IBED, especially as it connects our exciting applied research work with the International Renewable Energy Technology Institute (IRETI),” commented John Frey, Director for Business and Industry Partnerships, Minnesota State University, Mankato. IBED was established through a larger Sweden‐U.S.
technology transfer system that includes IRETI, the institute awarded to Minnesota in April. The goal of IRETI is to encourage the exchange of ideas and technologies in renewable energy and energy efficiency between Sweden and the U.S.

To register for the conference or to find out more information on IBED, go to www.bioenergydays.com or contact info@bioenergydays.com.

Say the word “biofuels” and most people think of grain ethanol and biodiesel. But there’s another, older technology called gasification that’s getting a new look from researchers at the U.S. Dept. of Energy’s Ames Laboratory and Iowa State Univ. By combining gasification with high-tech nanoscale porous catalysts, they hope to create ethanol from a wide range of biomass, including distiller’s grain left over from ethanol production, corn stover from the field, grass, wood pulp, animal waste, and garbage.

Gasification is a process that turns carbon-based feedstocks under high temperature and pressure in an oxygen-controlled atmosphere into synthesis gas, or syngas. Syngas is made up primarily of carbon monoxide and hydrogen (more than 85% by volume) and smaller quantities of carbon dioxide and methane.

It’s basically the same technique that was used to extract the gas from coal that fueled gas light fixtures prior to the advent of the electric light bulb. The advantage of gasification compared to fermentation technologies is that it can be used in a variety of applications, including process heat, electric power generation, and synthesis of commodity chemicals and fuels.

“There was some interest in converting syngas into ethanol during the first oil crisis back in the 70s,” says Ames Lab chemist and Chemical and Biological Science Program Director Victor Lin. “The problem was that catalysis technology at that time didn’t allow selectivity in the byproducts. They could produce ethanol, but you’d also get methane, aldehydes and a number of other undesirable products.”

A catalyst is a material that facilitates and speeds up a chemical reaction without chemically changing the catalyst itself. In studying the chemical reactions in syngas conversion, Lin found that the carbon monoxide molecules that yielded ethanol could be “activated” in the presence of a catalyst with a unique structural feature.

“If we can increase this ‘activated’ CO adsorption on the surface of the catalyst, it improves the opportunity for the formation of ethanol molecules,” Lin says. “And if we can increase the amount of surface area for the catalyst, we can increase the amount of ethanol produced.”

Lin’s group looked at using a metal alloy as the catalyst. To increase the surface area, they used nanoscale catalyst particles dispersed widely within the structure of mesoporous nanospheres, tiny sponge-like balls with thousands of channels running through them. The total surface area of these dispersed catalyst nanoparticles is roughly 100 times greater than the surface area you’d get with the same quantity of catalyst material in larger, macro-scale particles.

It is also important to control the chemical makeup of the syngas. Researchers at ISU’s Center for Sustainable Environmental Technologies , or CSET, have spent several years developing fluidized bed gasifiers to provide reliable operation and high-quality syngas for applications ranging from replacing natural gas in grain ethanol plants to providing hydrogen for fuel cells.

“Gasification to ethanol has received increasing attention as an attractive approach to reaching the Federal Renewable Fuel Standard of 36 billion gallons of biofuel,” says Robert Brown, CSET director.

“The great thing about using syngas to produce ethanol is that it expands the kinds of materials that can be converted into fuels,” Lin says. “You can use the waste product from the distilling process or any number of other sources of biomass, such as switchgrass or wood pulp. Basically any carbon-based material can be converted into syngas. And once we have syngas, we can turn that into ethanol.”

The research is funded by the DOE’s Offices of Basic Energy Sciences and Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

Photo notes: In this transmission electron micrograph of the mesoporous nanospheres, the nano-scale catalyst particles show up as the dark spots. Using particles this small (~ 3nm) increases the overall surface area of the catalyst by roughly 100 times.

Ames National Laboratory, http://www.external.ameslab.gov/

SOURCE: Ames National Laboratory