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Title: Efficient dehydration and recovery of ionic liquid after lignocellulosic processing using pervaporation

Abstract

Background Biomass pretreatment using certain ionic liquids (ILs) is very efficient, generally producing a substrate that is amenable to saccharification with fermentable sugar yields approaching theoretical limits. Although promising, several challenges must be addressed before an IL pretreatment technology can become commercially viable. One of the most significant challenges is the affordable and scalable recovery and recycle of the IL itself. Pervaporation (PV) is a highly selective and scalable membrane separation process for quantitatively recovering volatile solutes or solvents directly from non-volatile solvents that could prove more versatile for IL dehydration. Results We evaluated a commercially available PV system for IL dehydration and recycling as part of an integrated IL pretreatment process using 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium acetate ([C 2 C 1 Im][OAc] ) that has been proven to be very effective as a biomass pretreatment solvent. Separation factors as high as 1500 were observed. We demonstrate that > 99.9 wt% [C 2 C 1 Im][OAc] can be recovered from aqueous solution (≤20 wt% IL) and recycled five times. A preliminary technoeconomic analysis validated the promising role of PV in improving overall biorefinery process economics, especially in the case where other IL recovery technologies might lead to significant losses. Conclusions These findings establishmore » the foundation for further development of PV as an effective method of recovering and recycling ILs using a commercially viable process technology.« less

Authors:
; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER)
OSTI Identifier:
1618681
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1408409
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC02-05CH11231
Resource Type:
Published Article
Journal Name:
Biotechnology for Biofuels
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Name: Biotechnology for Biofuels Journal Volume: 10 Journal Issue: 1; Journal ID: ISSN 1754-6834
Publisher:
Springer Science + Business Media
Country of Publication:
Netherlands
Language:
English
Subject:
09 BIOMASS FUELS

Citation Formats

Sun, Jian, Shi, Jian, Murthy Konda, N. V. S. N., Campos, Dan, Liu, Dajiang, Nemser, Stuart, Shamshina, Julia, Dutta, Tanmoy, Berton, Paula, Gurau, Gabriela, Rogers, Robin D., Simmons, Blake A., and Singh, Seema. Efficient dehydration and recovery of ionic liquid after lignocellulosic processing using pervaporation. Netherlands: N. p., 2017. Web. doi:10.1186/s13068-017-0842-9.
Sun, Jian, Shi, Jian, Murthy Konda, N. V. S. N., Campos, Dan, Liu, Dajiang, Nemser, Stuart, Shamshina, Julia, Dutta, Tanmoy, Berton, Paula, Gurau, Gabriela, Rogers, Robin D., Simmons, Blake A., & Singh, Seema. Efficient dehydration and recovery of ionic liquid after lignocellulosic processing using pervaporation. Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13068-017-0842-9
Sun, Jian, Shi, Jian, Murthy Konda, N. V. S. N., Campos, Dan, Liu, Dajiang, Nemser, Stuart, Shamshina, Julia, Dutta, Tanmoy, Berton, Paula, Gurau, Gabriela, Rogers, Robin D., Simmons, Blake A., and Singh, Seema. Thu . "Efficient dehydration and recovery of ionic liquid after lignocellulosic processing using pervaporation". Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13068-017-0842-9.
@article{osti_1618681,
title = {Efficient dehydration and recovery of ionic liquid after lignocellulosic processing using pervaporation},
author = {Sun, Jian and Shi, Jian and Murthy Konda, N. V. S. N. and Campos, Dan and Liu, Dajiang and Nemser, Stuart and Shamshina, Julia and Dutta, Tanmoy and Berton, Paula and Gurau, Gabriela and Rogers, Robin D. and Simmons, Blake A. and Singh, Seema},
abstractNote = {Background Biomass pretreatment using certain ionic liquids (ILs) is very efficient, generally producing a substrate that is amenable to saccharification with fermentable sugar yields approaching theoretical limits. Although promising, several challenges must be addressed before an IL pretreatment technology can become commercially viable. One of the most significant challenges is the affordable and scalable recovery and recycle of the IL itself. Pervaporation (PV) is a highly selective and scalable membrane separation process for quantitatively recovering volatile solutes or solvents directly from non-volatile solvents that could prove more versatile for IL dehydration. Results We evaluated a commercially available PV system for IL dehydration and recycling as part of an integrated IL pretreatment process using 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium acetate ([C 2 C 1 Im][OAc] ) that has been proven to be very effective as a biomass pretreatment solvent. Separation factors as high as 1500 were observed. We demonstrate that > 99.9 wt% [C 2 C 1 Im][OAc] can be recovered from aqueous solution (≤20 wt% IL) and recycled five times. A preliminary technoeconomic analysis validated the promising role of PV in improving overall biorefinery process economics, especially in the case where other IL recovery technologies might lead to significant losses. Conclusions These findings establish the foundation for further development of PV as an effective method of recovering and recycling ILs using a commercially viable process technology.},
doi = {10.1186/s13068-017-0842-9},
journal = {Biotechnology for Biofuels},
number = 1,
volume = 10,
place = {Netherlands},
year = {Thu Jun 15 00:00:00 EDT 2017},
month = {Thu Jun 15 00:00:00 EDT 2017}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
Publisher's Version of Record
https://doi.org/10.1186/s13068-017-0842-9

Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 66 works
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Figures / Tables:

Fig. 1 Fig. 1: Simplified process flow diagram for the potential ionic liquid-based biorefinery and performance evaluation of pervaporation, ED and VD in one of the water-wash process scenarios

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Figures/Tables have been extracted from DOE-funded journal article accepted manuscripts.