New catalytic process for the production of premium gasoline and monomers of plastics and synthetic fibers from cellulosic biomass

该项目旨在从纤维素生物质中生产优质汽油和塑料和合成纤维的前体，如乙烯和丙烯。潜在的原料包括木材、木材残渣、农业和城市废物、纸浆和造纸工业的非商业价值副产品等。该工艺使用了我们工业催化实验室最近开发的新型混合、多功能和纳米级固体催化剂。这些催化剂的使用大大降低了生产成本，减少了工艺步骤，增加了所需产品的产量，同时减少了不需要的副产物的产量，并允许催化剂从反应流出物中瞬间分离。此外，一个新的环保程序的产品分离，不使用任何溶剂，导致额外的工艺优势。这种以生物质为基础的工艺，一旦得到充分开发，将成为目前生产运输燃料和几种重要塑料和合成纤维的单体的石油基工艺的极其有效的替代品。除了使用这种催化系统所带来的巨大优势外，值得一提的是，纤维素生物质在温室气体排放方面具有中性平衡。

This project aims at producing premium grade gasoline and precursors of plastics and synthetic fibres such as ethylene and propylene, from cellulosic biomass. The potential raw materials include wood, wood residues, agricultural and municipal wastes, non-commercially valuable by-products of the pulp and paper industry, etc. The process makes use of novel hybrid,multifunctional, and nano-sized solid catalysts recently developed in our Industrial Catalysis Laboratory. The use of these catalysts results in a significant decrease in the production cost by reducing the number of the process steps, increasing the yields of wanted products whereas decreasing those of the unwanted by-products, and allowing an instantaneous separation of the catalysts from the reaction effluent. Moreover, a new environmentally friendly procedure of products separation, not using any solvent, leads to additional process advantages. This biomass-based process, when fully developed, will be an extremely valid alternative to petroleum-based processes that currently produce transportation fuels and monomers for several important plastics and synthetic fibres. In addition to enormous advantages due to the use of such catalytic systems, it is worth mentioning that cellulosic biomass has a neutral balance in terms of greenhouse gas emission.