The energy department also awarded $1.7 million to a project run by Emery Energy Co., Ceramatec Inc. and Western Research Institute, a nonprofit research organization in Laramie, Wyo., which plans to demonstrate new, low-cost means to mitigate tars and oils in biomass syngas including high-impact corn stover. “In the case of conventional biomass syngas cleaning, it is done using either quench methods or tar crackers, and additional downstream equipment,” says Ben Phillips, president of Emery Energy. “We’re not disclosing our process, but novel methods will focus on the conversion and reforming of tars and oils that won’t use the processes I just mentioned. Also we use additional subsequent unit operations in the gas flow line to condition the syngas in order to get to the purity levels required for Fischer Tropsch catalysis and ethanol catalysis. We have a very holistic and integrated view between the gasifier and synthesis gas cleaning steps, and that integration will give us a technological advantage over other processes to produce the high-purity syngas necessary for downstream applications.”

WRI and Cerametic are both subcontractors for Emery Energy: Ceramatec is contributing technology and doing some co-engineering work with Emery Energy; and WRI is hosting the gasifier and syngas cleaning facility, also providing technology and operational services, personnel and resources to execute the project, Phillips says. Emery Energy is making modifications to its existing pilot gasifier system in Salt Lake City, and will relocate to WRI along with the synthesis gas cleaning train. Emery Energy is adding $1.2 million to DOE’s grant for a project total of nearly $3 million. “For the sake of this DOE program, we are going to be modifying and mitigating tar and oil species, i.e., converting those to additional syngas downstream of the gasifier,” he says.

Another syngas cleansing project receiving DOE grant funding includes Southern Research in partnership with Pall Corp., Thermochem Recovery International Inc. and Rentech Inc. The project will test a 1 megawatt gasifier for syngas generation with ceramic filter technology and a proven sorbent/catalyst system for syngas decontamination. Stephen Piccot, director of advanced energy and transportation technologies with Southern Research, says its project is just beginning as the last round of required paperwork is finalized. “So far we’ve assembled the team and completed a group design for a syngas cleanup system, which is part of Phase I,” Piccot says. In its entirety, Phase I consists of design, fabrication and testing of the gas cleanup system on Thermochem Recovery International’s biomass gasifier, installation of which is underway at Southern Research as part of a separate contract. This is a three-year project. By the end of 2008, fabrication of the syngas cleanup system is expected to have begun, with test runs and optimizing strategies to start sometime in 2009, along with Phase II.

“Phase II will be linking up all that stuff with a Fischer-Tropsch line and converting the clean syngas into FT wax,” Piccot tells Biomass Magazine. “Our proposal added on a refinery pilot step where we take the FT wax and convert it into clean diesel, and the final step for us is to evaluate the performance of the clean diesel in a passenger truck.”

Due to secrecy agreements, Piccot says he couldn’t discuss specifics about the catalysts, scrubbers or sorbent injection systems to be used in the design, but he did reveal what he sees as challenges ahead. “The technology to convert clean syngas into liquid products is catalyst based, and the requirements of the cleanliness of the syngas is rather fixed and we know what those are, but getting those proper technologies matched to meet those targets—that’s the challenge,” Piccot says. “The gas needs to be pretty clean to avoid poisoning those FT catalysts. I think technically it’s not as big a challenge as [figuring out] how to do it cost-effectively. That’s where the challenge is.” In a technical paper, Kneale writes: “There is much to be gained by tailoring the catalysis to maximize yield in the product state of choice and this continues to be a major subject of research by Albemarle and others.”

Assuming the engineers pulling all these pieces together find no mechanical issues getting everything to heat up at the same time without blowing a pump or burning out a heater, Kelley says the real test is demonstrating successful interaction between the operation of the gasifier, the amount of tars captured in the first catalyst and the productivity of the second catalytic bed.

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