Biofuels Digest Special Report on Gasification & Pyrolysis: UK Carbon Trust

The UK Carbon Trust has pledged $10 million to fund pyrolysis projects. Pyrolysis is the chemical decomposition of organic materials by heating in the absence of oxygen or other reagents.

According to the Carbon Trust, “Pyrolysis oil from sustainable sources of biomass is a potential source of low-cost fuels with low system greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, if it could be integrated into the existing transport fuel supply chain. However, the properties of the oil produced from current fast pyrolysis processes are unsuitable for direct integration. The Pyrolysis Challenge has the objective of producing oil with the properties required for integration through: a) modifying the pyrolysis process to produce better quality oil directly, or b) upgrading the oil before or at the refinery.

The Trust called for Expressions of Interest in spring 2008. Three consortia have progressed to due diligence: Axion Consulting, Centre for Process Innovation, and York Green Chemistry Centre.

Meanwhile, teams at Australia’s CSIRO and Monash University recently announced a new process for producing what it termed a “concentrated biocrude”.

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