Bioethanol production part 3

Today, bioethanol is the best alternative to MTBE as an octane booster in gasoline. Moreover, pure bioethanol or ethanol/gasoline blends can be used as a replacement of gasoline thereby decreasing the environmentally harmful emissions from the transportation sector. A substantial know-how within pre-treatment of biomass and production of bioethanol has accumulated in Denmark over the past years, and increasing international focus has been brought to the Danish concept of ethanol production. The present project is devoted to fully develop this concept within a 5 year period. The project is divided into 4 phases. This part, Part 3, is a continuation of the research and results achieved in 'Bioethanol production part 1 and 2'. The concept is composed of 4 key processes: 1) Pre-treatment of wheat straw and manure by wet-oxidation / wet-explosion, 2) enzymatic release of carbohydrates, 3) fermentation of all carbohydrates to ethanol using thermophilic bacteria and 4) detoxification of process water with the purpose of reusing process water and production of biogas. Concomitant with the continuing optimisation of all four processes, part 3 will specifically deal with larger scale testing and economic assessment of the process based on results from 'Bioethanol production Part 1, 2 and 3'