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ARS Home » Midwest Area » Peoria, Illinois » National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research » Bioenergy Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #338189
Title: Use of liquid/supercritical CO2 extraction process for butanol recovery from fermentation broth

Author
item Qureshi, Nasib
item Liu, Sean
item Hughes, Stephen
item Eller, Fred

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 2/13/2017
Publication Date: 6/19/2017
Citation: Qureshi, N., Liu, S.X., Hughes, S.R., Eller, F.J. 2017. Use of liquid/supercritical CO2 extraction process for butanol recovery from fermentation broth [abstract]. 2nd Workshop on ABE Fermentation and Recovery, June 19-20, 2017, Torun, Poland.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: In order for butanol fermentation to be a viable option, it is essential to recover it from fermentation broth using economical alternate in-situ product recovery techniques such as liquid/supercritical CO2 extraction as compared to distillation. This technique (liquid CO2 extraction & supercritical extraction) has advantages over others including requirement of no costly chemicals and being environmentally friendly. Considering these advantages, we applied this process for butanol recovery from model butanol solutions, fermentation media, and actual fermentation broth. It was determined that this technique does not remove nutrients from the fermentation media which is essential from an economic point of view. It was also found that other products (acetone & ethanol) that are associated with butanol fermentation were also simultaneously recovered, which is an advantage as it is necessary to recover them for favorable process economics. The highest butanol concentration in the recovered product was 573 gL-1 which was concentrated from a 12 gL-1 butanol feed. An additional advantage was that the raffinate (fermentation solution after recovery of butanol) was successfully refermented upon supplementation with glucose and nutrients suggesting that this method will enable recycle of process water.