Back to the Future with Biorefineries: Bottom‐Up and Top‐Down Approaches toward Polymers and Monomers

Abstract

The establishment of novel biomass processing schemes is key for achieving the much-needed carbon neutrality and counteract global warming. Biomass provides a range of monomers and macromolecules with great potential to replace petro-based materials in a wide range of applications. While important developments are ongoing in the biorefinery space, cross-sectoral, multidisciplinary partnerships are paramount to speed up and de-risk the industrialization of such technologies, and an integrated view is necessary to achieve process feasibility. This perspective explores both bottom-up and top-down approaches for biomass valorization based on the main natural polymers and monomers that can be extracted or isolated from biomass. A special emphasis is put on scalability, economic feasibility, and resource availability while the biggest challenges in the path toward the development of biorefineries are also discussed.

Pyrolytic lignin: a promising biorefinery feedstock for the production of fuels and valuable chemicals

“…emissions taxation, tighter regulations) will play a pivotal role in the development of biorefineries – a space also highly influenced by societal pressure and global politics. 268 It is clear that a new era of biobased industries, in which biomass is valorized as a whole by cascading upgrading steps of its components, is in full-speed development. Differently from the traditional “biomass to biofuels” models, such schemes unlock new types of businesses, often decentralized and suitable for more complex industries that aim at higher-value products and diversified markets.…”

Special Issue: Enabling Research in Smart Sustainable Plastic Packaging

“…The properties of plastics mean they will continue to play a role in society for the foreseeable future, and we believe that the growing appreciation of sustainability and circularity at a global level will see the design and development of novel processes and products involving polymers included in next generation plastics 19–21 . Understanding plastic stock and flows at a global level 22, 23 underpins the effective management of these resources within a circular economy 24–26 . We hope this collection inspires scholars from a range of disciplinary backgrounds to engage with the sustainability and circularity agenda.…”

“…[19][20][21] Understanding plastic stock and flows at a global level 22,23 underpins the effective management of these resources within a circular economy. [24][25][26] We hope this collection inspires scholars from a range of disciplinary backgrounds to engage with the sustainability and circularity agenda.…”

Lignin Valorization: Production of High Value-Added Compounds by Engineered Microorganisms

“…The main drawback is that existing processes still do not match the strict industrial requirements: in most cases the overall process takes days or even months to achieve a suitable degree of delignification [27]. However, in the last decade, several projects not related to bio-pulping were aimed at obtaining valuable chemicals or surfactants directly from lignin [28,29] or lignin-related material, such as advanced biopolymers [30,31].…”