Partners in Production--Chemical Companies Are Developing Technologies that Would Create New Market Opportunities for the Ethanol Industry

by Tim Albrecht (Ethanol Producer Magazine) The ethanol industry has polished its coproduction of distillers grains. Now, a handful of companies have found different uses for DDGS, or ethanol itself, that can provide new value-added coproducts for the industry.

Ethanol is flexible and can be used to make chemicals for products ranging from solvents to consumer goods—such as plastics and personal care items.

“Ethanol is also a good molecule to do a lot of chemistry because it’s a reactive molecule,” he (Luca Zullo, vice president of business development at Greenyug) says. “Many ethanol plants are in locations with availability of space and services, while providing a feedstock for us. There were lots of opportunities to do chemistry that’s valuable and can bring you to higher-value products.”

Innovative Technology
Through process intensification and liquid phase catalysis, Greenyug’s platform uses nondenatured ethanol to produce ethyl acetate and hydrogen. The ethyl acetate can be used in products such as paints, coatings, pharmaceuticals and a variety of other consumer goods. The system offers a smaller physical footprint than comparable systems found at petrochemical refineries.

Greenyug is working on constructing its first full-scale production facility adjacent to the Archer Daniels Midland Co. ethanol plant in Columbus, Nebraska. ADM will provide Greenyug’s facility with feedstock and other services, while Greenyug’s bolt-on system will provide the hydrogen byproduct as an energy source for the plant, Zullo says.

Similarly, xF Technologies Inc., a chemical company based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, has developed a process to convert DDGS into furoate, or 408, esters. XF initially plans to use the 408s in cleaning and processing solvents, plasticizers, paints, coatings and personal care products, as well as an oxygenate in the ethanol industry.

While ethanol is the main moneymaker, with a capacity of 20 MMgy, Gevo is focusing on increasing isobutanol production from its current 1.5 MMgy.

Pat Gruber, CEO of Gevo, says producing both ethanol and isobutanol fits the company’s goal of decarbonizing chemicals and fuels. “The most practical ways (to decarbonize fuels) are to use a fermentation technology like ethanol or isobutanol to convert fairly complicated feedstocks—such as corn—into simple alcohols that could either be sold directly or used as intermediates for chemical processes to transform them into other products—such as jet fuel, gasoline or into plastics.”

Gevo is working on multiple technologies for new coproducts from either ethanol or isobutanol. It has a technology that converts ethanol into products such as propylene, which is a plastic used in fibers and packaging materials, Gruber says. “We have a technology that looks like it works. It’s still in the development phase, but it works.

“That technology can also be used to generate things like diesel fuel and chemical products. We see there is a lot of value adding that can be done downstream, but we need to think in an integrated sense for it to work economically.”

On the isobutanol side, Gevo has proven how to convert isobutanol into butylene, Gruber says. “From butylene, we make jet fuel and isooctane, both of which are extremely clean—low particulates, low sulfur and low carbon. That’s what we’re working on commercializing.”

Gevo also plans to improve corn-oil extraction, Gruber says. “We’ve seen people capturing oil out of a plant and we do it too. But, we have visions of making food-grade vegetable oil. READ MORE