Chemicals from Renewable Feedstocks

Other than for energy use the main current and future applications for renewable feedstocks are likely to remain in the following areas  

Currently market pull for these new products is not a significant driver in most instances. 

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Chaudhari, R.V., Torres, A., Jin, X., Subramaniam, B., 2013. Multiphase catalytic hydro-genolysis/hydrodeoxygenation processes for chemicals from renewable feedstocks kinetics, mechanism, and reaction engineering. Industrial Engineering Chemistry Research 52, 15226-15243. 

Biomass feedstocks are already used in some processes, such as in oleochemistry (Chapter 4). In addition, biopolymers are somewhat well established, although their use and production still needs to increase and new improved (catalytic) methods for their production are required. Fine chemicals from renewables (Chapter 5) is another area in which various examples already exist, demonstrat-... 

From a chemical perspective, renewable feedstocks being highly functionalized molecules are very different from fossil feedstocks that are generally unfunctionalized. Therefore, the challenge in converting fossil resources, in particular crude oil, into useful products has been to develop methods that allow controlled addition of desirable chemical functionality to the hydrocarbon feedstock. Due to the quite low reactivity of the hydrocarbons it has... 

Zhang, M., Eddy, C., Deanda, K., Franden, M. A., Finkelstein, M., and Picataggio, S., Metabolic engineering of zymomonas-mobilis for ethanol-production from renewable feedstocks. Abstracts of Papers of the American Chemical Society 1995, 209, 115-BTEC. 

Another area is the production of chemical intermediates from renewable feedstocks. Cargill-Dow and Dupont are just two of the companies beginning to market biobased polymers and plastics to replace petroleum based polymers. Again, the fermentation fundamentals originally developed for food manufacturing continue to apply to a wide variety of products. 

Isomerizations and esterifications for the synthesis of chemicals and fuels from renewable feedstocks... 

A study commissioned by the EU in 2006 on biotechnological production of bulk chemicals from renewable resources [37] investigates 21 bulk chemicals using LCA for environmental assessment. Systems boundary is cradle-to-gate based on a functional unit of 11 of product. In addition, waste management is assessed where credits for energy recovery are accounted. As feedstock, crops for production... 

Clearly, synthesis of chemical products from renewable feedstocks is an industrial reality, a fact that should be celebrated. Many opportunities exist for new products from these feedstocks. CO2 fixation, after so many years of activity, is still being studied, with new example reactions being found. Waste... 

Dehydroshikimic Acid A Building Block for Chemical Synthesis from Renewable Feedstocks... 

Succinic acid currently is manufactured by chemical processes (1). Many attempts have been made to develop a fermentation process for the production of succinic acid from renewable feedstocks such as corn-derived glucose. A number of patents have been issued on the microbial production of succinic acid (4-7). However, none of these has been applied toward the commercial production of succinic acid. 

Other interesting and growing enviromnentally friendly indnstries which ACOMP may be applied to are biofuels and green polymers made from renewable feedstocks such as ethanol-derived ethylene and other processes. ACOMP may eventnaUy be nsed to monitor fermentation processes to gange conversion of biomass to the active biofuel or chemical feedstock. This is a completely novel and untested application for the technology, but could be of substantial commercial and enviromnental benefit. 

It is worth mentioning that cyclic acetal-type saccharide-based surfactants are promising not only with respect to their environmental properties but also as concerns their synthesis. Recently, the Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation elaborated and commercialized a process of direct hydrogenation of aliphatic carboxylic acids to the corresponding aldehydes [181,182]. This process allows long-chain aliphatic aldehydes to be obtained from natural fats and oils, and, as a consequence, to produce cyclic acetal-type saccharide surfactants entirely from renewable feedstock. 

Isoprene, 2-methyl-l,3-butadiene, is a common organic compound and a key commodity chemical for the rubber and textile industries. Today, isoprene production at the industrial scale relies on the petroleum-derived feedstock and well-developed chemical processes. However, with increasing industrial demand for isoprene, the current petroleum-based isoprene production capacity is not sufficient for the anticipated future markets. Nevertheless, an alternative process that does not rely on petroleum resources and refining capacity is under development for isoprene production. Bioisoprene, which is produced from renewable feedstock through biocatalysts, will be a promising alternative to petroleum-derived isoprene [1]. 

A methodology was described to assess the feasibihty of success in making commodity chemicals from renewable resources. The methodology uses a five-step process in the assessment. The first step is portfolio selection, and some of the key selection criteria are high theoretical yields from substrate, high market interest, and volume. The second phase involves initial economic screening and uses an economic criterion called the Fraction of Revenue for Feedstock (FRF). In this calculation, the cost of the feedstock is divided by the value of all the products, and the products that show the most promise are those where the fraction is smallest. This value takes into account the yields of the products derived from the various feedstock components. The third phase is a comparative analysis of bioprocessing routes that uses a raw material cost ratio, which... 

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