First in the world to produce bio-methanol from black liquor
In April the first bottle of bio-methanol from black liquor syngas was produced at the laboratory at Solander Science Park, situated by Chemrec’s development plant in Piteå. “This was a great stride forward – theory became reality”, says PhD student Caroline Häggström. From the bio-methanol the energy efficient fuel bioDME can be produced.
A syngas stream from Chemrec’s development plant is led into the laboratory where Caroline Häggström, PhD student at the department of chemical engineering and geosciences at Luleå University of Technology, does her experiments. Recently she was able to produce the world's first drops of bio-methanol from black liquor syngas.
BioDME is the next step
Jonas Hedlund, professor of chemical technology, in charge of the research program, tells about the future plans:
– We have recently started experimenting with other catalysts to produce bioDME. When the syngas is in contact with copper methanol is formed, when the methanol is in contact with zeolite we get DME. We hope to produce the first drops of bioDME after the summer.
The experiments are made within the project “Cathalytic synthesis of methanol/DME from black liquor gasification” at the Luleå University of Technology, in cooperation with ETC, Energy Technology Centre and Chemrec supported by the Swedish Energy Agency. The aim of the project is to establish competence about methanol and DME, DiMethyl Ether, in Sweden.
It should be noted that the Chemrec projects now being developed are based on methanol and DME synthesis technology already commercial and in widespread use.
> Syngas – the link between feedstock and synthetic products
> Simulation of gasifier scale-up