Lignin: from lab to commercial reality Tom Browne Program Manager, Biorefinery World Congress on Industrial Biotechnology July 20, 2015
The refinery concept (bio or otherwise) Energy products come from residues and residues come from higher value products: Feed material Identify remaining value Extract value Residue High-value products Heat, power, fuels 2
Kraft Pulping 101 The kraft mill looks a lot like a biorefinery So what else can you do with lignin? Wood chips Recovery boiler Pulping Black liquor (lignin) Pulp and paper Heat, power, fuels 3
Extraction of lignin from pulp mill black liquor First patented in 1949 by Tomlinson & son Practised at mills in Cornwall ON and elsewhere Why? Offload the recovery boiler and make more pulp Generate new revenue streams 4
Tomlinson patents (1949-1951) Liquor from pulping Weak BL Tank MEE To Concentrators and RB H 2 SO 4 H 2 O Acidification Coagulation Filter & press Dryer Lignin CO 2 5
Paleologou patents (2014-2015) Liquor from pulping Weak BL Tank MEE To Concentrators and RB H 2 SO 4 H 2 O Oxidation Acidification Coagulation Filter Belt filter Press Spray Flash dryer Lignin O 2 CO 2 The LignoForce system 6
From lab to commercial (I) Bench-top work to evaluate liquors from many different Canadian pulp mills Some filtered really well turns out they were oxidising their liquor But Tomlinson said: Do Not Oxidise! Patent succeeded because it was not obvious Financial support: Canadian Forest Service (Natural Resources Canada) Canadian forest industry 7
From lab to commercial (II) Disclose the patent proposal to NORAM Canadian engineering and technology company Well known in P&P Initial engineering estimates were reasonable NORAM agreed to license the technology Financial support: NORAM, CFS 8
From lab to commercial (III) Move from bench to pilot Scaleup (how NOT to build a full-scale plant) Provide 100 kg samples to potential customers Show mill operators how it works Feedback to R&D: What REALLY needs fixing Financial support: Resolute Thunder Bay: in-kind (pulp mill) CRIBE: operating funds (Ontario government) CFS: pilot equipment, ongoing R&D NORAM 9
Lignin Demonstration Plant 10
Biomass is local This is the single most important factor in ROCE calculations Local means bio-scale is at most ~1 GW TH Probably closer to 500 MW TH 10X smaller scale than petroleum industry Costs per unit output will be higher Focus on high-value products will be absolutely 11 critical
What about the fuel value? Several lignin plants proposed for Scandinavia will use the lignin as a fuel North American context does not allow this Cheap natural gas and shale oil Low or no cost to carbon emissions 12
Plywood resin prices (inflation adjusted) 5,000 $ 4,000 $ 3,000 $ 2,000 $ 1,000 $ - $ 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020 13 Sources: SRI; http://www.inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_rate/historical_oil_prices_table.asp
Plywood resin prices vs oil prices (inflation adjusted) 1,500 $ 1955, 1960 y = 8.28x + 588 R² = 0.784 1,250 $ 1,000 $ Here, you can make money with lignin 750 $ 1980 500 $ 0 $ 20 $ 40 $ 60 $ 80 $ 100 $ 120 $ Data for 1955, 1960, 1980 ignored in the regression analysis 14 Sources: SRI; http://www.inflationdata.com/inflation/inflation_rate/historical_oil_prices_table.asp
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Commercialisation: a lot of critical issues Solid science This is actually the easy part Quickly move to pilot Government support here is critical Pilots are not economic, but you ll never get a full-scale plant built without a pilot Customers If it s a better buggy whip, it still won t sell if no one wants buggy whips 16
Financial support from a wide group Canadian government (NRCan, NSERC) Ontario government (CRIBE, ORF) Alberta government Quebec government Canadian forest products industry Especially Resolute Forest Products, Thunder Bay NORAM 17
What s next? Based on all this, West Fraser has made the decision to invest in a commercial-scale plant Financial support: CFS Alberta Government 18
Thank you Thomas Browne, ing., Ph.D. Directeur de recherches, Bioraffinage/énergie Research Manager, Biorefinery/energy 570, boul. Saint-Jean, Pointe-Claire (QC) H9R 3J9 Tel +1 514-630-4104 Cell +1 514-266-4104 tom.browne@fpinnovations.ca Follow us on www.fpinnovations.ca