Classifications

• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12P—FERMENTATION OR ENZYME-USING PROCESSES TO SYNTHESISE A DESIRED CHEMICAL COMPOUND OR COMPOSITION OR TO SEPARATE OPTICAL ISOMERS FROM A RACEMIC MIXTURE
  • C12P7/00—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds
  • C12P7/02—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds containing a hydroxy group
  • C12P7/04—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds containing a hydroxy group acyclic
  • C12P7/06—Ethanol, i.e. non-beverage
  • C12P7/065—Ethanol, i.e. non-beverage with microorganisms other than yeasts
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12M—APPARATUS FOR ENZYMOLOGY OR MICROBIOLOGY; APPARATUS FOR CULTURING MICROORGANISMS FOR PRODUCING BIOMASS, FOR GROWING CELLS OR FOR OBTAINING FERMENTATION OR METABOLIC PRODUCTS, i.e. BIOREACTORS OR FERMENTERS
  • C12M21/00—Bioreactors or fermenters specially adapted for specific uses
  • C12M21/12—Bioreactors or fermenters specially adapted for specific uses for producing fuels or solvents
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12M—APPARATUS FOR ENZYMOLOGY OR MICROBIOLOGY; APPARATUS FOR CULTURING MICROORGANISMS FOR PRODUCING BIOMASS, FOR GROWING CELLS OR FOR OBTAINING FERMENTATION OR METABOLIC PRODUCTS, i.e. BIOREACTORS OR FERMENTERS
  • C12M21/00—Bioreactors or fermenters specially adapted for specific uses
  • C12M21/18—Apparatus specially designed for the use of free, immobilized or carrier-bound enzymes
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12M—APPARATUS FOR ENZYMOLOGY OR MICROBIOLOGY; APPARATUS FOR CULTURING MICROORGANISMS FOR PRODUCING BIOMASS, FOR GROWING CELLS OR FOR OBTAINING FERMENTATION OR METABOLIC PRODUCTS, i.e. BIOREACTORS OR FERMENTERS
  • C12M23/00—Constructional details, e.g. recesses, hinges
  • C12M23/58—Reaction vessels connected in series or in parallel
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12P—FERMENTATION OR ENZYME-USING PROCESSES TO SYNTHESISE A DESIRED CHEMICAL COMPOUND OR COMPOSITION OR TO SEPARATE OPTICAL ISOMERS FROM A RACEMIC MIXTURE
  • C12P39/00—Processes involving microorganisms of different genera in the same process, simultaneously
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12P—FERMENTATION OR ENZYME-USING PROCESSES TO SYNTHESISE A DESIRED CHEMICAL COMPOUND OR COMPOSITION OR TO SEPARATE OPTICAL ISOMERS FROM A RACEMIC MIXTURE
  • C12P7/00—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds
  • C12P7/02—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds containing a hydroxy group
  • C12P7/04—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds containing a hydroxy group acyclic
  • C12P7/06—Ethanol, i.e. non-beverage
  • C12P7/08—Ethanol, i.e. non-beverage produced as by-product or from waste or cellulosic material substrate
  • C12P7/10—Ethanol, i.e. non-beverage produced as by-product or from waste or cellulosic material substrate substrate containing cellulosic material
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12P—FERMENTATION OR ENZYME-USING PROCESSES TO SYNTHESISE A DESIRED CHEMICAL COMPOUND OR COMPOSITION OR TO SEPARATE OPTICAL ISOMERS FROM A RACEMIC MIXTURE
  • C12P7/00—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds
  • C12P7/02—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds containing a hydroxy group
  • C12P7/04—Preparation of oxygen-containing organic compounds containing a hydroxy group acyclic
  • C12P7/06—Ethanol, i.e. non-beverage
  • C12P7/14—Multiple stages of fermentation; Multiple types of microorganisms or re-use of microorganisms
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12R—INDEXING SCHEME ASSOCIATED WITH SUBCLASSES C12C - C12Q, RELATING TO MICROORGANISMS
  • C12R2001/00—Microorganisms ; Processes using microorganisms
  • C12R2001/01—Bacteria or Actinomycetales ; using bacteria or Actinomycetales
• • C—CHEMISTRY; METALLURGY
  • C12—BIOCHEMISTRY; BEER; SPIRITS; WINE; VINEGAR; MICROBIOLOGY; ENZYMOLOGY; MUTATION OR GENETIC ENGINEERING
  • C12R—INDEXING SCHEME ASSOCIATED WITH SUBCLASSES C12C - C12Q, RELATING TO MICROORGANISMS
  • C12R2001/00—Microorganisms ; Processes using microorganisms
  • C12R2001/01—Bacteria or Actinomycetales ; using bacteria or Actinomycetales
  • C12R2001/145—Clostridium
• • Y—GENERAL TAGGING OF NEW TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS; GENERAL TAGGING OF CROSS-SECTIONAL TECHNOLOGIES SPANNING OVER SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE IPC; TECHNICAL SUBJECTS COVERED BY FORMER USPC CROSS-REFERENCE ART COLLECTIONS [XRACs] AND DIGESTS
  • Y02—TECHNOLOGIES OR APPLICATIONS FOR MITIGATION OR ADAPTATION AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE
  • Y02E—REDUCTION OF GREENHOUSE GAS [GHG] EMISSIONS, RELATED TO ENERGY GENERATION, TRANSMISSION OR DISTRIBUTION
  • Y02E50/00—Technologies for the production of fuel of non-fossil origin
  • Y02E50/10—Biofuels, e.g. bio-diesel

Definitions

• Biomass is a relatively inexpensive, renewable and abundant material that can be used to generate fuels, chemicals, fibers, and energy.
• large-scale utilization of plant biomass is hindered, at least in part, by the lack of technologies capable of efficiently converting the biomass into component fractions or reactive intermediates at a low cost.
• most plant biomass is resistant to digestion by cellulase.
• production of biofuels from non- food biomass has been slow to develop due to expensive enzyme and bioprocess equipment required to access the sugars in lignocellulose.
• the present disclosure relates to systems and methods for converting biomass efficiently using a system comprising a plurality of bioreactors connected in series and using consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) for conversion of cellulosic biomass into fuels and/or chemicals without added enzymes and without thermochemical pretreatment.
• CBP consolidated bioprocessing
• CBP consolidated bioprocessing
• the present disclosure provides a system having multiple continuous, well-mixed bioreactors connected in series — a configuration referred to as "cascade continuous.”
• cascade continuous helps reduce reaction time, which, in turn, helps reduce processing cost.
• Continuous processing offers particular advantages for lignocellulose processing via CBP. Some of these advantages over more conventional processing strategies involving added cellulase and related enzymes are surprising and unexpected.
• first-order kinetics have been observed for many microbial systems mediating lignocellulose deconstruction, including defined cultures of thermophilic bacteria.
• a system for converting biomass into a liquid fuel comprising a) a reservoir; and b) a plurality of reactors arranged in series.
• each reactor has an inlet, and an overflow outlet, wherein the inlet of first reactor of the plurality of reactors is connected to the reservoir.
• the plurality of reactors comprise a defined culture, which contains at least one living organism capable of producing at least one carbohydrate-active enzyme (CAZyme).
• CAZyme carbohydrate-active enzyme
• the configuration of the system allows the overflow from the first reactor in the series feeds the second reactor immediately downstream of the first reactor, and overflow from the N reactor feeds N+1 reactor immediately downstream of the N reactor, and so on, wherein N is an integer ranging from 1 to n, and wherein n is an integer, and n+1 is equal to the total number of reactors in the plurality of reactors.
• the system may further comprise one or more mills placed between any two neighboring reactors to further process the moving biomass.
• the system may comprise a starting biomass, wherein the starting biomass is loaded into the reservoir, and the biomass flows one-way from the reservoir to the first reactor.
• the plurality of reactors may contain 3 or more reactors, or at least 4 reactors, or at least 5 reactors, and so on.
• the system runs continuously or semi-continuously.
• the initial enzyme concentration is high and accessible substrate concentration is high in the initial bioreactors in the cascade, which is advantageous over batch or single CSTR configurations.
• the ratio between the CAZyme and the substrate in the first reactor is at least 0.1, or at least 1 unit, or at least 10 units of CAZyme per pmol of the substrate.
• the ratio between the CAZyme and the substrate in each reactor of the system is at least 0.1, or at least 1 unit, or at least 10 units of CAZyme per pmol of the substrate.
• the CAZyme is in excess of the substrate to ensure substrate access and fast reaction time.
• the liquid fuel is ethanol, or other chemicals.
• the system may include a defined culture comprising a living organism such as Clostridium thermocellum and a hemicellulose-fermenting microorganism selected from the group consisting of Thermoanaerobacterium thermosaccharolyticum and Thermoanaerobacterium saccharolyticum.
• the starting biomass is a member selected from the group consisting of corn stover, sugar cane, wheat or rice straw, miscanthus, switchgrass, energy cane and combination thereof.
• cascade continuous system is applied to CBP, but not to simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (SSF), because the benefits of the cascade continuous configuration are specific to CBP, and not to systems with added enzymes including but not limited to SSF. While traditional CBP process typically has low initial enzyme concentration, cascade continuous system with CBP achieve high initial enzyme concentration which helps speed up the conversion of biomass to biofuel. [0019] In certain embodiments, a method is also disclosed for using the system described above to produce a liquid fuel from biomass.
• SSF simultaneous saccharification and fermentation
• the method may include, a) loading a starting biomass into the reservoir; b) allowing the biomass to move from the reservoir into the first reactor where at least a portion of the biomass is converted into alcohol, c) allowing the system to run continuously or semi-continuously wherein the reservoir feeds the first reactor and overflow from the N reactor moves to N+1 reactor immediately downstream of the N reactor, d) repeating steps (a)-(c) above to allow the biomass to move from the N reactor to the N+1 reactor through the series of reactors until it reaches the last reactor, e) allowing the system to run continuously or semi-continuously, wherein steps of CAZyme production, substrate hydrolysis and fermentation by the defined culture without adding enzymes all occur within each of the plurality of reactors, and f) collecting the liquid fuel from the plurality of reactors.
• the solids loading in the system is about 5-30 wt.%, or about 10-25 wt.% solids, or about 15-25 wt.% solids.
• FIG. 1 shows a preferred embodiment of the bioreactor configuration described herein.
• FIG. 2 shows a comparison of solubilization data using fungal cellulase SSF and C. thermocellum.
• FIG. 3 shows an exemplary graph for the kinetic characterization of continuous culture.
• DETAILED DESCRIPTION [0024] Described herein are systems and methods for converting biomass to ethanol or other desired products. In a preferred embodiment, for example as shown in FIG.
• the system of the present invention comprises: a) a reservoir; b) a first bioreactor, a second bioreactor, and a third bioreactor; and c) a first mill coupled to the first bioreactor and the second bioreactor and a second mill coupled to the second bioreactor and the third bioreactor.
• the system comprises: a) a reservoir; b) a plurality of bioreactors, with each bioreactor in series; and c) a plurality of mills, wherein each mill is coupled to two bioreactors.
• a system for converting biomass into a liquid fuel comprising: a) a reservoir; and b) a plurality of reactors arranged in series, each reactor having an inlet, and an overflow outlet, the inlet of first reactor of the plurality of reactors being connected to the reservoir, wherein the plurality of reactors comprise a defined culture comprising at least one living organism capable of producing at least one carbohydrate-active enzyme (CAZyme) , wherein steps of CAZyme production, substrate hydrolysis and fermentation by the defined culture without added enzymes all occur within each of the plurality of reactors.
• CAZyme carbohydrate-active enzyme
• Item 1 The system of Item 1, wherein overflow from a first reactor in the series feeds a second reactor immediately downstream of the first reactor, and overflow from the N reactor feeds N+1 reactor immediately downstream of the N reactor, wherein N is an integer ranging from 1 to n, and wherein n is an integer, and n+1 is equal to the total number of reactors in the plurality of reactors.
• Item 3 The system of any preceding Items, further comprising one or more mills placed between two neighboring reactors.
• Item 4 The system of any preceding Items, further comprising a starting biomass, wherein the starting biomass is loaded into the reservoir, and the biomass flows one- way from the reservoir to the first reactor.
• the system of any preceding Items wherein the plurality of reactors comprises 3 or more reactors.
• Item 6. The system of any preceding Items, wherein the system runs continuously or semi-continuously.
• Item 7. The system of any preceding Items, wherein the series of reactors running continuously or semi-continuously shortens reaction time from the biomass to the liquid fuel.
• Item 8. The system of any preceding Items, wherein the reaction time from the biomass to the liquid fuel is shorter as compared to reaction time in a batch or single continuous bioreactor.
• Item 9 The system of any preceding Items, wherein ratio between the CAZyme and the substrate in the first reactor is at least one unit of CAZyme per pmol of the substrate.
• Item 10 The system of any preceding Items, wherein the liquid fuel is ethanol.
• Item 11 The system of any preceding Items, wherein the defined culture comprises Clostridium thermocellum and a hemicellulose-fermenting microorganism selected from the group consisting of Thermoanaerobacterium thermosaccharolyticum and Thermoanaerobacterium saccharolyticum.
• Item 12 The system of any preceding Items, wherein the starting biomass is a member selected from the group consisting of corn stover, sugar cane, wheat or rice straw, miscanthus, switchgrass, energy cane and combination thereof.
• Item 13 The system of any preceding Items, wherein the starting biomass is a member selected from the group consisting of corn stover, sugar cane, wheat or rice straw, miscanthus, switchgrass, energy cane and combination thereof.
• a method of using the system of claim 1 to produce a liquid fuel from biomass comprising a) loading a starting biomass into the reservoir, b) allowing the biomass to move from the reservoir into the first reactor where at least a portion of the biomass is converted into alcohol, c) allowing the system to run continuously or semi-continuously wherein the reservoir feeds the first reactor and overflow from the N reactor moves to N+1 reactor immediately downstream of the N reactor, d) repeating steps (a)-(c) above to allow the biomass to move from the N reactor to the N+1 reactor through the series of reactors until it reaches the last reactor, e) allowing the system to run continuously or semi-continuously, wherein steps of CAZyme production, substrate hydrolysis and fermentation by the defined culture without adding enzymes all occur within each of the plurality of reactors, and f) collecting the liquid fuel from the plurality of reactors [0040] Item 14.
• Item 13 The method of Item 13, wherein the liquid fuel is ethanol.
• Item 15 The method of any one of Items 13-14, wherein one or more mills positioned between a reactor and an immediately downstream reactor processes the overflow mechanically.
• Item 16 The method of any one of Items 13-15, wherein the system runs in a continuous or semi-continuous mode, not a batch mode.
• Item 17. The method of any one of Items 13-16, wherein the solids loading is about 10-25 wt.% solids.
• Item 18 The method of any one of Items 13-17, wherein the starting biomass is selected from the group consisting of corn stover, sugar cane, wheat or rice straw, miscanthus, switchgrass, energy cane and combination thereof.
• biomass refers to cellulosic biomass.
• biomass refers to plant biomass which includes any plant-derived matter (woody or non-woody) that is available on a sustainable basis.
• Plant biomass may include, but is not limited to, agricultural crop wastes and residues such as corn stover, wheat straw, rice straw, sugar cane bagasse and the like, grass crops, such as switch grass, alfalfa, winter rye, and the like.
• Plant biomass may further include, but is not limited to, woody energy crops, wood wastes and residues such as trees, softwood forest thinnings, barky wastes, sawdust, paper and pulp industry residues or waste streams, wood fiber, and the like.
• plant biomass may include yard waste, such as grass clippings, leaves, tree clippings, brush, etc., vegetable processing waste, as well as recycled cardboard and paper products.
• Bioconversion requires many, large bioreactors (e.g., 15 to 20 one million gallon reactors) for a medium sized facility producing 50 million gallons of ethanol per year. Thus, bioreactors represent a substantial fraction of overall capital investment for any lignocellulose conversion process and are the single largest cost contributor for consolidated bioprocessing with cotreatment (C-CBP).
• C-CBP consolidated bioprocessing with cotreatment
• the total carbohydrate concentration, C is equal to the sum of the accessible concentration , plus the inaccessible concentration

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• 2023
  • 2023-08-18 CN CN202380058028.8A patent/CN119698480A/zh active Pending
  • 2023-08-18 EP EP23855510.6A patent/EP4573205A1/de active Pending
  • 2023-08-18 WO PCT/US2023/030593 patent/WO2024039857A1/en not_active Ceased

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