Study of biorefineries based on experimental data: production of bioethanol, biogas, syngas, and electricity using coffee-cut stems as raw material

• Published in: Environmental science and pollution research international Vol. 28; no. 19; pp. 24590 - 24604
• Main Authors: Aristizábal-Marulanda, Valentina, Solarte-Toro, Juan Camilo, Cardona Alzate, Carlos Ariel
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.05.2021; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Alternative energy sources; Aquatic Pollution; Atmospheric Protection/Air Quality Control/Air Pollution; Biofuels; Biogas; Biorefineries; Biotechnology; Carbon dioxide; Climate change; Coffee; Earth and Environmental Science; Ecotoxicology; Electricity; Energy conversion efficiency; Energy efficiency; Environment; Environmental Chemistry; Environmental Health; Environmental performance; Environmental science; Ethanol; Lignocellulose; Mathematical analysis; Refining; Stems; Synthesis gas; Utilities; Waste and Biomass Management & Valorization; Waste Water Technology; Water Management; Water Pollution Control; Energy evaluation; Biomass gasification; Energy-driven biorefineries; Agricultural waste upgrading; Life-cycle assessment; Anaerobic digestion
• ISSN: 0944-1344; 1614-7499
• DOI: 10.1007/s11356-020-09804-y

Energy-driven biorefineries can be designed considering biotechnological and thermochemical conversion pathways. Nevertheless, energy and environmental comparisons are necessary to establish the best way to upgrade lignocellulosic biomass and set the requirements of these processes in different scenarios. This paper aims to evaluate experimentally a biorefinery producing energy vectors using coffee-cut stems (CCS) as feedstock. The obtained yields were the basis for energy and environmental analysis, in two different biorefinery scenarios: (i) production of bioethanol and biogas and (ii) production of syngas and electricity. The energy results indicated that the overall energy efficiency calculated in the first scenario was only 9.15%. Meanwhile, the second biorefinery configuration based on thermochemical routes presented an energy efficiency value of 70.89%. This difference was attributed to the higher consumption of utilities in the biorefinery based on biotechnological routes. The environmental results showed that the impact category of climate change for the first biorefinery (i.e., 0.0193 kg CO 2 eq./MJ) had a lower value than that of the second process (i.e., 0.2377 kg CO 2 eq./MJ). Thus, the biorefinery based on the biotechnological route presented a better environmental performance. Additionally, the results for both biorefineries allowed concluding that the inclusion of by-products and co-products in the calculation of the environmental analysis can dramatically affect the results.