Sustainability of biorefineries

Sacramento-Rivero JC. (2012). A methodology for evaluating the sustainability of biorefineries framework and indicators. BiofBioprod Bioref, 6, 32-44. 

Catalysis is thus a driver for sustainability and societal challenges [51] and for a sustainable energy [52, 53[. New demand for applications (e.g., the area of biorefineries [54, 55[) and new advances in both the ability to control catalyst characteristics through nanotechnologies [56, 57[ and to understand catalytic reactions [58-62] have greatly renewed the interest in catalysis and changed the research topics and approaches with respect to few years ago. We could thus conclude that catalysis is not only a key element for the sustainability of chemical processes but also that the recent advances in this area have further enhanced its critical role. 

Making Order Classification of Biorefineries Quantities of Sustainably Available Biomass Quantification of Snstainability Starch- and Sugar-Based Biorefinery... 

De Meester S, CaUewaert C, De Mol E, Van Langenhove H, Dewulf J. (2011). The resource footprint of biobased products a key issue in the sustainable development of biorefineries. Biofuels Bioprod Bioref, 5, 570-580. 

A whole plant biorefinery appears as a preferable concept, especially if the transformation units are located close to the crop production sites. Thus, the location of a biorefinery plant can be dictated by the nature of the oleaginous crop, and therefore, the place where its production, linked to the climate, is performed. Depending on the scale of production, the size of the biorefinery will be adapted. If possible the close-by proximity of bioproducts users will be ideal, but if it is not the case, it will be preferable to build a new biorefinery in an industrially rich area where heat integration can be performed. Moreover, this location will also be rich in transportation facilities. To be efficient, the territorial biorefinery should be adapted to multiple feedstocks and multiple bioproduct production in order to comply with crop management techniques. By opposition, another type of biorefinery, focused on transportation hubs such as the Port of Rotterdam or the Port of Ghent, is based on the same model as petrol. The type of biomass is often limited to a few crops and so is the number of large scale bioproducts. In this case, the long distance travels of the feedstocks can appear detrimental in their sustainability evaluation. 

In summary, the framework presented is a promising tool to represent the ever-increasing number of biorefinery alternatives with their competing technologies and routes and help evaluate them at their optimality for early-stage design and analysis purposes in terms of techno-economic analysis. Sustainability analysis and environmental impact assessment are included in the framework which enables a more detailed and comprehensive analysis of the biorefinery alternatives. The framework helps formulate a multicriteria evaluation (techno-economic, environmental impact, and sustainability analysis) of the biorefinery concept. 

Feedstock hydrolysis is one of the major steps of a biorefinery Although biomass is an abundant, globally available raw material for biorefinery, the hydrolysis of such materials is one of the bottlenecks. This is an energy-demanding step, and in most cases chemicals with possible environmental hazards, such as strong acids or alkalis, are used. In order to keep up the status of a sustainable industry, biorefinery should stick to environmentally friendly feedstock hydrolysis techniques. In Table 2.2 different reports on feedstock hydrolysis have been summarized. As is evident from Table 2.2, acid, alkali, thermal treatment, enzyme, and microbial agents can be used for feedstock hydrolysis. All these methods have their own advantages and drawbacks, and sustainable biorefinery will benefit from further research on this subject. 

---