(157g) Catalytic Upgrading of Carbohydrates in Paper Sludge to Sustainable Aviation Fuels

The primary objective of this project is to develop a technology for converting the carbohydrates in paper sludge, a wet organic industrial-waste stream, into a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), both economically and sustainably. US-DOE has identified wet organic waste streams as valuable potential feedstocks for the bioeconomy. This project will develop an integrated process using wet paper sludge where no drying of the feedstock is needed. The process includes (a) ash removal from paper sludge, (b) enzymatic hydrolysis of carbohydrates to monosaccharides, (c) dehydration of pentoses and hexoses to furfural and HMF, (d) aldol condensation of furans with ketones to intermediates having molecules with 10-14 carbons, (e) hydrodeoxygenation of the intermediates to paraffins with excellent properties for blending in jet, and (f) robust techno-economic analysis (TEA) and life cycle assessment (LCA) to focus research on developing cost-effective routes to address key cost barriers, and ensure the sustainability of the process. The developed process will be validated at a relevant scale to produce sufficient HC biofuel for fuel property testing.

The team produced a hydrocarbon fuel from paper sludge for aviation fuel testing and its performance was comparable to a commercial jet fuel. During the presentation, the process optimization and trade-off analysis between TEA and LCA will be explained in details.

This project has been supported by US Department of Energy (DOE) and plans to be completed in 2023.