Biomass pretreatment process
AssigneeKiOR, Inc.
InventorsMichael Brady, Paul O'Connor, Dennis Stamires
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Abstract
A process is described for pretreating lignocellulosic biomass. The process comprises swelling the lignocellulosic biomass with an aqueous liquid. The pretreated lignocellulosic biomass may be used as a feedstock for the enzymatic conversion to ethanol, or in a thermal conversion. process to produce bio-oil. The pretreatment results in a greater yield and, in the case of a thermal conversion process, a better quality of the bio-oil. The pretreatment process may be used to adjust the composition and amount of inorganic material present in the lignocellulosic biomass material.
Claims20
A process for pretreating a lignocellulosic biomass material for conversion to bio-oil, said process comprising:
- (i) contacting the lignocellulosic biomass material with an aqueous fluid, to form a swollen solid lignocellulosic biomass;
- (ii) dewatering the swollen biomass to form a solid modified lignocellulosic biomass material having an increased bulk porosity;
- and
- (iii) subjecting the solid modified lignocellulosic biomass material to enzymatic hydrolysis, thermoconversion, or combinations thereof.
A pre-treatment process for preparing a lignocellulosic biomass material for conversion to a bio-oil, said pre-treatment process comprising the steps of:
- (i) swelling the biomass material with a solvent, optionally aided by pH control, application of mechanical action, the incorporation of additive(s) and temperature control;
- (ii) removing solvent from the swollen solid biomass material by applying mechanical action to the solid biomass material to form a solid modified lignocellulosic biomass material having an increased bulk porosity;
- and
- (iii) subjecting the solid modified lignocellulosic biomass material to enzymatic hydrolysis, thermoconversion, or combinations thereof.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.