Wednesday, August 4, 2010: 10:00 AM
Grand C (Hyatt Regency San Francisco)
The realization of biofuels at a commercial scale will depend on processes that are energetically, environmentally, and economically sustainable. One main thrust of biofuels research, therefore, has been in techno-economic analysis of biofuel alternatives, which facilitates process design, optimization, and performance evaluation. We present a process model for a lignocellulosic ethanol biorefinery that is open to the biofuels academic community. Beyond providing plant design, operating conditions and economic performance, this wiki-based platform provides a transparent tool that can be revised by the academic and professional research community for analyzing, exploring, and communicating the impact of process advances and alternatives for biofuels production. The model is available for download (at http://econ.jbei.org) and will be updated based on feedback from the community of experts in biofuel-related fields. By making the assumptions and performance metrics of this model transparent, we anticipate this tool can help provide a consensus on the energy-related, environmental, and economic performance of lignocellulosic ethanol.