Techno-Economic and Environmental Assessment of Biomass Gasification and Fischer–Tropsch Synthesis Integrated to Sugarcane Biorefineries

Abstract

Large-scale deployment of both biochemical and thermochemical routes for advanced biofuels production is seen as a key climate change mitigation option. This study addresses techno-economic and environmental aspects of advanced liquid biofuels production alternatives via biomass gasification and Fischer–Tropsch synthesis integrated to a typical sugarcane distillery. The thermochemical route comprises the conversion of the residual lignocellulosic fraction of conventional sugarcane (bagasse and straw), together with eucalyptus and energy-cane as emerging lignocellulosic biomass options. This work promotes an integrated framework to simulate the mass and energy balances of process alternatives and incorporates techno-economic analyses and sustainability assessment methods based on a life-cycle perspective. Results show that integrated biorefineries provide greenhouse gas emission reduction between 85–95% compared to the fossil equivalent, higher than that expected from a typical sugarcane biorefinery. When considering avoided emissions by cultivated area, biorefinery scenarios processing energy-cane are favored, however at lower economic performance. Thermochemical processes may take advantage of the integration with the typical sugarcane mills and novel biofuels policies (e.g., RenovaBio) to mitigate some of the risks linked to the implementation of new biofuel technologies.

Addressing the contributions of electricity from biomass in Brazil in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals using life cycle assessment methods

“…Besides, economic allocation had only up to 3% change compared to energetic allocation. There are other possible uses of sugarcane lignocellulosic material (i.e., bagasse and straw), such as in the second-generation ethanol production (Junqueira et al, 2017), in thermochemical pathways for biofuel and bioenergy production (Bressanin et al, 2020(Bressanin et al, , 2021, and as animal feed (Souza et al, 2019;2021b), among others. Other LCA modeling approaches for handling residues and coproducts such as the consequential approach could also lead to interesting insights (Heimersson et al, 2019;Schaubroeck et al, 2021).…”

“…The application of LCA methodologies for bioenergy systems is broadly documented in the literature (e.g., Bressanin et al., 2020; Maier et al., 2019; Prasad et al., 2020; Sampaio et al., 2019; Staples et al., 2018). The GHG emissions of biomass electricity are usually reported to be lower than those from fossil‐based electricity.…”

“…kWh −1 (Liu et al., 2017), while it ranged from 29 to 65 gCO 2 eq. kWh −1 in Brazil (Bressanin et al., 2020). In China, biomass electricity performed better than fossil electricity, but worse than wind, hydropower, and nuclear and photovoltaic electricity considering primary energy demand, industrial water utilization, global warming potential, and acidification potential (Yue et al., 2019).…”

Advanced Biofuels Based on Fischer–Tropsch Synthesis for Applications in Diesel Engines

“…The risk assessment of such a process will include parameters such as CAPEX, costs related to industrial inputs, labor, input materials, and changes in the price of electricity, fuel, carbon allowance, etc. [ 44 ].…”

Isolation, Characterization, and Depolymerization of l‐Cysteine Substituted Eucalyptus Lignin

“…[1][2][3][4][5] Efficient conversion of lignocellulosic biomass, to a certain extent, can not only alleviate the dependence on fossil energy, but also benefit the environmental protection and greenhouse gas emission reduction, which is of great importance to green and sustainable economic development. [6][7][8][9] Lignin, a major component of lignocellulosic biomass accounted for 15-35 wt% (varies from plant species and tissues), is the most abundant aromatic resource on the earth yet highly underutilized. [10,11] In general, the primary goal of traditional lignocellulose biorefinery is to get the value products from the carbohydrate fractions, especially cellulose.…”