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Biomass‐based chemical production using techno‐economic and life cycle analysis
Author(s) -
Athaley Abhay,
Saha Basudeb,
Ierapetritou Marianthi
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
aiche journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.958
H-Index - 167
eISSN - 1547-5905
pISSN - 0001-1541
DOI - 10.1002/aic.16660
Subject(s) - raw material , furfural , biomass (ecology) , production (economics) , life cycle assessment , work (physics) , capital cost , environmental science , chemical industry , process engineering , waste management , pulp and paper industry , engineering , environmental engineering , chemistry , economics , catalysis , mechanical engineering , biochemistry , oceanography , electrical engineering , organic chemistry , macroeconomics , geology
Furfural has been selected as one of the top 30 biomass derived platform compounds by the U.S. Department of Energy based on several indicators including the raw material used for production, estimated processing cost, technical complexity, and market potential. In this work, several high value chemicals such as butadiene, surfactants, jet‐fuels, and lubricants are produced from furfural. The paper proposes the integrated flowsheet to produce those chemical and techno‐economic and life cycle analysis is performed to compare the minimum selling price and environmental impacts of the integrated process. The capital and operating cost for production of lubricants and surfactants is the highest when compared with other products. Production of surfactants performs the best in terms of environmental impacts except in water depletion when compared with other processes while butadiene production performs the worst regarding the environmental effects.