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Application of Hydrothermal Reactions to Biomass Conversion pp 171–187Cite as

Hydrothermal Liquefaction of Biomass in Hot-Compressed Water, Alcohols, and Alcohol-Water Co-solvents for Biocrude Production

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Part of the book series: Green Chemistry and Sustainable Technology ((GCST))

Abstract

Hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) is a technology for directly converting biomass into clean liquid fuels (biocrude) in the presence of water or water-containing solvent/co-solvent and more commonly a suitable catalyst at a temperature of 200–400 °C and under moderate to high pressure (5–25 MPa). Two key operating parameters, solvent type/composition and catalysts play significant roles in the performance of a HTL process including biomass conversion, biocrude oil yield and oil quality, etc., which are closely related to the economic feasibility of the process for industrial/commercial applications. A HTL process with properly designed solvent and catalysts would lead to a high yield of biocrude oil (up to 65 %) with a high quality (lower oxygen content). This chapter provides an overview on the effects of solvents (focusing on water, alcohols, and alcohol-water co-solvents) and catalysts on the HTL processes, and their industrial applications.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful for the financial support from the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) through the Discovery Grant. We also acknowledge the funding from the NSERC/FPInnovations Industrial Research Chair Program and Ontario Research Fund—Research Excellence Program in Forest Biorefinery, partnered with FPInnovations, Arclin and Bioindustrial Innovation Center. “In addition, the financial support from Lignoworks, BioFuelNet, MITACS and CENNATEK is gratefully acknowledged.”

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Chemical and Fuels from Alternative Resources (ICFAR), The University of Western Ontario, London, ON, N6A 5B9, Canada

    Chunbao Charles Xu, Yuanyuan Shao, Zhongshun Yuan, Shuna Cheng, Shanghuang Feng, Laleh Nazari & Matthew Tymchyshyn

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  1. Chunbao Charles Xu
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  2. Yuanyuan Shao
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Correspondence to Chunbao Charles Xu .

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  1. School of Environmental Science & Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China

    Fangming Jin

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Xu, C.C. et al. (2014). Hydrothermal Liquefaction of Biomass in Hot-Compressed Water, Alcohols, and Alcohol-Water Co-solvents for Biocrude Production. In: Jin, F. (eds) Application of Hydrothermal Reactions to Biomass Conversion. Green Chemistry and Sustainable Technology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-54458-3_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-54458-3_8

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