ORALS

SESSION: AdvancedMaterialsWedPM1-R6	4th Intl. Symp. on New and Advanced Materials and Technologies for Energy, Environment and Sustainable Development
Wed Nov, 7 2018 / Room: Guaratiba (60/2nd)
Session Chairs: Marina Nisnevitch; Session Monitor: TBA

15:15: [AdvancedMaterialsWedPM108] Keynote
Process Intensification in Biorefineries – the Way to High Added Value Products
Ludo Diels¹ ; ¹VITO/UA, Mol, Belgium;
Paper Id: 314 [Abstract]

The global trend towards sustainability and resource efficiency urges us to transform our concept of chemical plants and strive for compact, safe, energy-efficient, and environment-friendly sustainable processes. These developments share a common focus on process intensification. At the level of core conversion processes in a biorefinery, one way to achieve process intensification entails combining reaction and separation in such a way that the overall result is more sustainable, delivers better product quality, reduces the equipment size, lowers the solvent use both for (i) bioprocesses and (ii) chemical processes. Several bio-based processes are plagued by limited product titers and volumetric productivities due to product inhibition. Other processes suffer from side reactions decreasing the yield of the process. Many enzymatic reactions are characterized by suboptimal reaction equilibria. For such processes, it can be advantageous to invest in a recovery technology that allows the selective separation of the product during fermentation or biocatalysis. In-situ product recovery (ISPR) is a key technology platform to intensify bioprocesses. Specific cases will be presented and the benefits for the selected processes explained. Clever integration of separation technology can also be beneficial for chemical processes requiring high dilution to prevent precipitation or intramolecular reactions or processes that suffer from substrate inhibition. The concept of volume intensified dilution not only allows to get similar or better yields and purities, but also a considerable reduction of solvent use. In upstream and downstream processing, proper pretreatment of feedstocks to remove inhibitory components and selective separations in downstream processing are essential as well. Bioprocesses have the disadvantage to operate under quite dilute conditions. This means that concentrating the product, re-using the water and desalinating the water are becoming key challenges for the success of future bio-based processes. These challenges will be explained via different examples from practice.

SESSION: EnvironmentalWedAM-R7	7th Intl. Symp. on Environmental, Policy, Management , Health, Economic , Financial, Social Issues Related to Technology and Scientific Innovation
Wed Nov, 7 2018 / Room: Pontal (50/2nd)
Session Chairs: Kyoshik Park; Ludo Diels; Session Monitor: TBA

12:10: [EnvironmentalWedAM03] Plenary
Biobased Aromatics – Challenges, Hurdles, and Opportunities
Ludo Diels¹ ; ¹VITO/UA, Mol, Belgium;
Paper Id: 313 [Abstract]

Aromatics are among the most important resources for the chemical industry. Many materials are made from aromatics and lead to higher or better performance. Brand owners are on the search for more sustainable molecules (e.g. bio-based). But also the introduction of higher performance and safety issues can be seen as the most important driver for this development. Currently virtually all aromatic building blocks are made from fossil oil. This presentation is anticipating the expected growing shortage of aromatics from the petrochemical industry and the widely shared ambition to green the chemical industry. On top of that one of the main drivers is to develop innovative molecules that are safer and more performing. This lecture will give an overview of the problems linked to wood-based refineries and the availability of lignin sources. Next, it will give an overview of the different approaches worldwide to valorize lignin and to produce bio-based aromatic molecules. It will indicate the hurdles, challenges and needs for value chain approaches. A nice example in integrated approach is the The Shared Research Center, Biorizon. Biorizon, an initiative of TNO, ECN, VITO and the Green Chemistry Campus, develops technologies to produce aromatics derived from plant-based (waste) streams. Biorizon brings together global leaders (large industry and SMEs) in the fields of feedstock, conversion, equipment, building blocks, materials and end-products. Biorizon aims to be a world leader in the development of biobased aromatics to provide the chemical megacluster around the Netherlands, Flanders (Belgium) and Nordrhein Westfalia (Germany) with innovative, sustainable building blocks leading to many different applications in the products marketed by brand owners and small companies. The objective is to make commercial production feasible for industrial partners by 2025 at the latest. Biorizon utilizes plant-based streams such as wood or its fractions lignin and sugars to develop functionalized biobased aromatics for performance materials, chemicals & coatings. Biorizon is based on the open innovation methodology, bringing together collective intelligence of various industries, companies and knowledge organizations. The multi-disciplined technological need, as well as the long term roadmaps based on thermochemical conversion, sugar chemistry for furanes and lignin depolymerisation-based chemicals for functionalized aromatics lead to a large network of applied research projects with more than 40 industrial partners, sharing research, intelligence, investments, risks and workload in different projects.

References:
[1] www.biorizon.eu/community