Chemical building blocks for future generations At the end of this century, the age of fossil resources may have come to an end. Reserves are drying up rapidly and finding new ones is becoming increasingly difficult. Besides, burning fossil resources increase the carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere which is believed to lead to warming up the earth’s climate. For these two reasons, resistance against the use of fossil resources is growing. This forces us to think of alternatives to the petroleum industry. The petroleum industry does not only produce (transportation) fuels but also many of the base chemicals that are used to make all kind of products that we heavily depend on. Bio resources seem to be the only alternative to the petroleum industry. [10] However, since the petroleum industry is such a dominant industry around the world the transition to a bio-based society will be a paradigm change. [10]
It is quite a challenge to get the desired base chemicals from the bio waste material. To accommodate the transition from fossil resources to bio resources, a lot of research is going on in the field of the so called ‘bio based society’.
In this essay we will try to find the answer to the question if the petroleum based society can be replaced by the bio based society in the (near) future. To do so, we will approach this question from different aspects. We will start by looking at which base chemicals are important and how they can be made from biomass. Then we will examine the competition between food and the bio-chemicals after which we will switch to the environmental profit of a transition towards a bio-based society. Subsequently Making bio-chemicals
Bio-based base chemicals (from now on bio-chemicals) are organic chemicals used in the chemical industry. ‘Base chemicals’ means these chemicals are the smallest building blocks of all kind of products we use in daily live. These base chemicals can be further modified to eventually form the product by chemical modifications, which is called downstream processing. [3] There are a few main groups of base chemicals: ethylene, propylene, BTX (benzene, toluene, xylenes) and some C4 chemicals. [7, 3] All these chemicals can be obtained from bio-resources.
We divide the feedstock into two categories, namely first and second generation feedstock. First generation bio-feedstock are crops that are rich in sugar/starch or edible triglycerides/oils. The problem with these crops is that they are often used for human nourishment as well. [3] Second generation bio-feedstock are non-edible feedstock, for example lignocellulose, that do not interfere with food production. Rather, they are the bio-residue of crops, which makes them widely abundant and very cheap. [3] First generation bio-feedstock is easy to produce and process. They are often crops like sugarcane or corn. The starch (polysaccharides) are easily hydrolyzed to glucose which in turn can be relatively easy be converted to all kind of base chemicals. Likewise, vegetable oils are hydrolyzed to fatty acids and glycerol and subsequently further processed to base chemicals. [8]
Second generation bio-feedstock seems the be the most promising for the future. Unfortunately, before we will reach the ideal case scenario in which we use second generation bio-feedstock, some scientific and technological hurdles still need to be overcome. A lot of research is going on in the the field of lignin-chemistry. The problem with lignin is that it is a very complex rigid polymer with various different linkages which makes is for catalysts difficult to break the polymer into the desired base chemicals. [9] When there has been enough scientific progress to make various base chemicals from lignin, this will be a huge step in the transition to the bio-based society.
Food versus chemicals
There are concerns about the interference of first generation bio-feedstock and the food production. However, study by dr. Patel et al. found that both for first- and second generation bio-feedstock relatively a small amount of land is needed to produce on a scale that is realistic until 2050. In different scenario’s, this is ‘1.0 up to 38.6 million ha’ for starch/sugar and ‘0.4 to 15.6 million ha’ for lignocellulose in Europe.[1] In total Europe contains about 180 billion ha of farmland.[1] On the other hand, their report also contains numbers of land use in the case if ‘all organic chemicals are covered 100% by White biotechnology products’. In that case we see a completely different picture, where in different scenario’s respectively 126 and 52 million ha of farmland for starch/sugar and lignocellulose production is needed. [1] These numbers show that, for the far future, it is crucial exploit second generation bio-feedstock. On the short term though, exploiting first generation bio-feedstock seems to be a good option as well because of the relatively low land usage and the cheap and simple production process.
According to research conducted by Sanders and Ben: ‘On a European scale, there will be enough biomass for the production of 20% transportation fuels and all chemicals from biomass including 10% of EU electricity, if we improve agricultural yield and obtain a much more efficient use of the biomass harvested for the application in feed, chemicals, fuels, electricity and soil quality.’ [11] This conclusion is in accordance with the research conducted by dr. Patel et al. [1], that farmland is not a constraint in the near future. However, in a future which is 100% bio-based, there are still issues to be solved with respect to land usage.
Environmental profit
Except from being independent to fossil resources, another major reason to exploit bio-resources is the ‘sustainability’. When using bio-resources, we use the so-called ‘short carbon cycle’, which is the opposite of the so-called ‘long carbon cycle’. […] The ‘short carbon cycle’ resources are believed to produce lesser carbon dioxide because the burned carbon comes from the ecosystem itself and is not newly introduced to it like in the ‘long carbon cycle’. Yet it is good to question whether bio-chemicals are genuinely better for the environment by looking at the complete product cycle.
The product life cyle (LCA) ‘involves the evaluation of products and processes within defined domains, [….], on the basis of quantifiable environmental impact indicators, […].’ [2]. The environmental impact of different bio-based chemicals versus petroleum-based chemicals can be compared by LCA. Furthermore, LCA can point out which part of the life cycle has a big environmental impact and calls for more optimization. [2] However, lots of different parameters and assumptions can be used in the LCA, leading to different outcomes. This makes it at the moment still difficult to make a good comparison between various chemicals.
In a research conducted by Argonne, they compared the greenhouse gas emmission (GHG) for a bunch of bio-based chemicals versus their petroleum counterparts. They found that in all cases, the use of bio-based chemicals would lead to a reduction of the GHG, although the reduction fluctuates heavily between 20% up to 80%. [22] This seems a good result, but this only counts for GHG and not for other parameters like toxicity and soil fertility. Research by Belboom and Léonard on bio-based HDPE (high density polyethylene) versus petroleum-base HDPE showed that the bio-based HDPE would indeed result in a carbon dioxide reduction. However, on all other environmental impact factors the bio-based HDPE scored worse than the fossil-based HDPE. [23] This example shows that we have to pay attention in the transition to the bio-based society that we don’t ‘shift the pollution between categories’. [23] In order to get a complete view of the consequences of the use of either bio-based of petroleum-based chemicals, those other parameters must be somehow included in the LCA. [2] Agricultural intensification
Now let’s have a deeper look into soil fertility/agricultural intensification which is one of the ‘other parameters’.
The EU aims to target 25-30% implementation of bio-based chemicals in the total amount of plastics used before the period of 2030-2040[12]. Therefore, the demand for the bio-based products rises which forces intensification of land use. This could possibly result in the drainage of soil fertility. In ‘Hoofdrapport – De bodem in de bio-economie’ the CE Delft investigates the effects on the soil by an intensification of the agriculture.[12] In this research the aim is on optimizing land use for this bioeconomy and it is investigating which crop uses the least amount of fertilizer per ‘avoided kg of CO2’, considering the scenario that 25% of all fossil chemicals are replaced to biomass.
The conclusion of this research is that a higher demand of biomass will have consequences to the environment and that there is fluctuation in crops looking at soil fertility and effectiveness for avoiding CO2 use. Four of the, so called, ‘feedstock chains’ score better than the rest. The ‘feedstock chains’ that were investigated are the most promising crops for future implementation of biomass production, or are already in use for biomass production. This research looked into depletion in the fertility of the soil when taking of all biomass from the land by harvest is the case and it also considered leaving part of the plant from the harvest on the land where the leftovers of the plant are considered as nutrition for future plants.
Growing crops, for instance wheat, especially for the biowaste feedstock is the least favourable, because than an increased amount of fertilizer is needed for the demand, which means less avoidance of CO2 emission. However, using sugarcane leaving the top and leafs on the land, than there is less depletion of the soil, because than part of the biomass is left with important nutrition for the future plants.
There is also the possibility for optimizing production of feedstock by using the waste streams of the agricultural refining processes. The biomass from this feedstock would be either burned in a powerplant or used in natural fertilizer.[24] This feedstock is according to dr. Niels Schenk the most promising.
Intensification of land use will have a consequence on the biodiversity.[12] The question rises which feedstock chain will have the least consequence on the biodiversity.
Market analysis
Right now the production of bio-based base chemicals is still in the emerging/growing phase of the life-cycle model for technologies, which means still a lot of research needs to be done, both fundamental and technological. However, besides technological process, the market for bio-based products is of great importance too for the transition to succeed. To examine whether there is a market for these products, several points are important. First, the costs of the bio-based chemicals must at least compete with the costs of conventional petroleum chemicals. Second, there must be a market- and public acceptance of the bio-based products. In the next section, these two factors will be discussed.
Economic analysis
The economic compatibility of bio-chemicals and petroleum chemicals depends on both the oil price the price of the biomaterial. In the next case, we take sugar as the bio material, since it is a very important one but of course there are other ‘raw materials’ as well (see …). In 2006, dr.
Martin Patel et al. proposed three different future scenarios. [1] The first one, called ‘LOW’, assumes an oil price of 30 $/barrel and a sugar price of 400 €/ton. The second one, called ‘MEDIUM’, assumes an oil price of 66$/barrel and a sugar price of 200 €/ton. The third scenario, ‘HIGH’, assumes an oil price of 83 $/barrel and a sugar price of 70 €/ton.
From an economic aspect, the situation of bio-chemicals looks rather positive. Only for the ‘LOW’ scenario, there will be a small expense of 0.13 billion €. The ‘MEDIUM’ scenario shows macroeconomic savings of 6.7 billion € and the ‘HIGH’ scenario is even predicted to give 74.8 billion € savings. These data seem to correspond to what Niels Schenk said about his company BioBTX. He thinks he can make BTX economically viable if the oil price more than 50 $/barrel. The fact that bio-based chemicals are not economically viable partly has to do with the years of optimization in the petrochemical industry, which makes it relatively cheap and energy efficient. [6] As indicated before, except from sugar there are many other bio-resources. Generally speaking, low cost sources, like bio-waste material/residues, seem to be very competitive with the petroleum resources. However, higher cost resources, such as certain crops that are especially planted as bio-resources, end up being much more expensive than their petroleum analogues. [2] Dr. Martin Patel et al. also looked to the amount of bio-based chemicals produced in the different scenario’s. They found that in 2050 in the most optimistic case in the EU 38% of the organic base chemicals would be bio-based. For the ‘LOW’ and ‘MEDIUM’ scenario’s, this would be 7% and 17% respectively. The data shows that bio-based base chemicals can become economically viable, but even in the most optimistic case the amount of bio-based base chemicals is still minor compared to the petroleum based base-chemicals in 2050.
Market acceptance
Market acceptance is the ‘willingness of firms or public procurement officers to purchase bio-based products’. [3] For new products that enter the marked, like bio-based products, the market acceptance is of crucial importance. Peuckert and Quitzow have had a deeper look into the driving forces and barriers of market acceptance for bio-based products. They found that the independence from fossil resources together with the positive view that many people have of bio-based products are the two most important factors for companies to start with bio-based products. The most important barriers were fast changing regulations, the high costs of production and the unstable feedstock prices. [3] However, as discussed in the market analysis paragraph, the high costs only refer to high cost resources, as for other bio-resources the bio-based products are expected to be less expensive than petroleum products. We think the that the driving forces will help to overcome the other barriers and thus we think there is good market acceptance for bio-based products.
Public engagement
Not only the market acceptance, which only deals with businesses, is important for implementation of the bio-based society, but the public acceptance plays a crucial role as well .[4] Mainly because they are the ones that can buy bio-based products instead of petroleum based.
However, the public is generally speaking hardly aware of the transition to the bio-based society.
[5] When the public does want to get involved, it will be confronted with the stakeholder representations, which does not always align with the public representations [4]. For the stakeholder, the public is mainly a consumer of the product to be introduced and thus the stakeholder wants to let the consumer buy as much as possible. The public however, sees many different ways to engage themselves. According to Sleenhof and Ossenweijer more discussion is needed on how the public should be engaged in the transition to the bio-based society. [4] Policy
The problem in the bio-based economy right now is: perceived uncertainty about properties and weak market transparency.[18] The European Commission calls out five different fronts to tackle.
Namely the accessibility to the feedstock, research & development & innovation, accessibility to the market, public procurement and communication.[25] These five fronts are lined up in a list of priority recommendations of the EU. A way to overcome these problems is to make certain technical requirements for carrying out the name of a bio-based chemical and make legislations for a level playing field in both bio-energy as bio-based chemicals and stimulate projects by funding. According to the European Commission; ‘standardization, communication, labeling and certification are the key to overcome weak market transparancy.’[18] In 2008 the European Commission initiated four mandates to standardize bio-based chemicals to certain technical requirements.[16] These mandates are initiated to support the competitiveness in a bio-based economy.
Since there is a increase in population of the earth the food demand will rise in the upcoming years. This means that there are major technical challenges lying ahead with an increase in food demand and also an increase in demand for biomass (as discussed earlier). In the cause of this challenge these mandates also aim at the growing food demand and therefore a synergy with the demand of biomass feedstock for the bio-based economy.[14] These mandates take the food supply, logically, as the primary product. Support in knowledge is therefore a key to make this synergy happening.
These mandates are all based on a research done by European Commission on the bioeconomy in Europe called ‘The Bioeconomy Strategy’.[16] This research aims at overcoming the obstacles called earlier. Also ‘The Bioeconomy Strategy’ calls for a more informed dialogue, in particular on the role of scientific advancements, and better interactions between existing bioeconomy-supporting policies at EU and Member States level. The Bioeconomy Strategy will support a better alignment of the EU innovation and research funding aimed at improving bioeconomy related policies. Not only is the paradigm shift needed for the environment, but it is also for a sustainable economy in the future.
All these researches are done under the ‘Lead Market Initiative’ (LMI)[18]. This initiative is to unlock market potential and overcome hindering of the innovation for certain goods divided up into six categories: eHealth, protective textiles, sustainable construction, recycling, bio-based products and renewable energies. Also, the aim of this initiative is to produce jobs and revenues.
An estimate of the European Commision says an annual turnover of €130 billion and 1.9 million jobs by 2020 in these six categories. Which could potentially increase.
Through this LMI the EU Ecolabel© has been updated. Now the Ecolabel© can only be carried by competent bodies who can act according to Annex I of Regulation (EC) 66/2010[19] of European Parliament and the Council and EN ISO 14024 type I[20] drafted by the International Organization for Standardization. The Ecolabel© is to promote a healthier and more sustainable lifestyle.
Bio-based plastics can now also apply for this label.[21]