In this first period, the Coordinator CIMV has implemented the first task of the WP1, i.e. the Business case of the 2G BIOPIC technology at DP scale, that will serve as a demonstration of the technical potential of the technology and an explanation of how the construction of the Demonstration Plant (DP) would allow de-risking the Flagship Plant (FP) scale-up. This initial Business Case is a decision-making tool to legitimate investment in the Demonstration Plant and will be used to obtain public and/or private funds and loans, in complement of the H2020 support, to finance investments associated to the set-up of the DP.
In this first work, CIMV has assessed the economic performances of 2G BIOPIC technology, based on different data, collected through various channels, as this first task has been done at an early stage in the project:
• Compile data from other connected projects
• Investigation with partners to collect technical data
• Investigate with chemical suppliers for products costs and markets
• Investigate with stakeholders
• Gather data for prices and markets from information and survey companies report
Based on these data, the 2G Biopic technology would start competing with 1G technologies. which affirm to achieve a breakeven point of 0.34 €/LEtOH. The 2G BIOPIC technology clearly appears to be more performant than any existing second-generation ethanol production technology. Concerning its economic performances, the 2G BIOPIC FP shows profitability and good return on investment which would make it a good choice of technology to invest in.
In tise first period, the required documents such as mass balance, PDS (Process Data Sheet) and PFD (Process Flow Diagram) have been established for the design and sizing of the 2GBIOPIC DP,in the frame of the WP2.
All these process documents are the result of CIMV’s experience on the pilot plant and allow the selection and the sizing of the different equipment required to reach the process specifications.
In this first part of the work, a front-end engineering and design has been conducted to produce quality process and engineering documentation of sufficient depth, for further detailed engineering, procurement, and construction of the DP. in this first period, the equipment has been selected and the equipment suppliers identified for the main parts of the 2G BIOPIC process. This engineering work has been carried out by CIMV with the support of engineering companies.
The location of the 2GBIOPIC DP was envisaged in Commentry (France) in an existing Industrial site, to minimize the investment cost by sharing the utilities and services.
The layout has been done on this site and the request of authorisation has been done in order to obtain the a prefectorial order of declaration certificates ( the DP is listed under environmental protection (Installations Classées au titre de la Protection de l'Environnement)) .The French autorities have deliver a construction permit as well as the operating licence.
In parallel, the construction of a strain producing the tailor-made enzyme cocktail has been implemented by Dyadic.The analysis of the selected strains for cocktail evaluation, has been done and the saccharification efficiency of the six fermented strains on wheat straw pulp and hemicellulose syrup.it has been confirmed that these enzyme cocktails are able to perform the hydrolysis of the C6 and C5 streams produced by the 2GBIOIC technology, separately or in combination (co-hydrolysis) with high efficiency. The first results have shown that the fermentation process of the selected strains has to be improved.
BBEU has tested the improved strain and fermentation process at a pilot scale. A purification protocol needed to be developed for conditioning of the product . After obtaining high protein titers via fermentation and a high recovery via DSP, BBEU’s purpose was to scale-up the improved enzyme process. This preliminary work gave information to WP2.
In WP4, the strain selection and adaptation have been performed on wheat straw hydrolysate, through evolutionary engineering especially designed for the targeted process. In this first period, a strain has been selected by Taurus Energy and amplified by INSAT and used to Ferment a co-hydrolysate derived from the 2GBIOPIC technology to produce ethanol. The first conclusion is that the selected strain lead to a very high performance in glucose fermentation while its behavior toward the xylose is less effective. The target of 90 gEtOH.kgmedium-1 even if not copmletely achieved in this period, seems to be feasible after small optimisation.
