Biofuel from a Container

(Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft/TechExplore) ... Even then, gasoline would still be required to power combustion engines, which will be operating for decades to come. The only sustainable way to keep us mobile is to replace this gasoline with alternative fuels.

Scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute for Microengineering and Microsystems IMM, working together with twelve research groups from seven countries in the EU project BIOGO, have developed a technique to produce just such an eco-friendly biofuel. The novel fuel's ingredients come from forests: "Wood waste and tree bark are available in great quantities throughout Europe but, up to now, have all been ignored as a resource. That makes them an ideal raw material, as they don't need to be specially cultivated and thus won't compete with food production," explains Prof. Gunther Kolb from Fraunhofer IMM, who coordinated the EU project.

"To achieve this, we have developed mobile production units that can be housed in containers and installed where they are needed."

A prototype novel biofuel plant stands in the courtyard behind the Fraunhofer Institute. Waste products from the wood industry are transformed in the white container into high-quality gasoline.

"The goal of the BIOGO project was to develop a plant that could fit in a 40-foot container with standard dimensions of 12 x 3 x 3 meters, and that could accommodate all the procedural and processing steps," is how Kolb explains the result of four years of intensive research and development. "At the same time, we had to make the manufacturing process as environmentally-friendly and resource-efficient as possible.

"As long as the price of oil remains at its present level, the new technology won't be able to compete. The key question will be whether we in Europe really want to move away from fossil raw materials and are prepared to exempt eco-fuels from taxation or subsidize their production." READ MORE