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LanzaTech will use industrial waste gas carbon monoxide as feedstock in its production of 2,3 butanediol
2,3 bUTANEdIOL dorIS de guzman & joSeph Chang new york

bio-based 2,3 bdO set for 2014 sales

LanzaTech expects to commercialize carbon monoxide-based ethanol by 2013 and 2,3 butanediol by the end of 2014
Butadiene (BD), the intermediate chemical used in synthetic rubber production, will soon find another upstream biological route through the cost-economic production of a chemical building block called 2,3 butanediol (2,3 BDO) being developed by US-based industrial biotechnology firm LanzaTech. LanzaTech aims to commercialize production of its 2,3 BDO using industrial waste gas carbon monoxide as feedstock by the end of 2014, LanzaTech CEO Jennifer Holmgren said in an interview with ICIS. The 2,3 BDO would be produced by fermenting carbon monoxide with LanzaTechs proprietary microorganism to make ethanol and 2,3 BDO as co-products. The microorganism used is a bacterium in the clostridium family. The technology would allow for the production of up to 50% of 2,3 BDO by volume and the rest in ethanol, said Holmgren. LanzaTech has been producing CO-based 2,3 BDO at a 15,000 gal/ year pilot facility in Glenbrook, New Zealand, at the site of local metals producer BlueScope Steel. In April, LanzaTech started operating its 100,000 gal/year ethanol demonstration facility in Shanghai, China, using carbon monoxide from an adjacent steel mill owned by its partner Baosteel Group, Chinas largest steel producer. A commercial ethanol/2,3 BDO production plant at a world-class steel mill would have capacity of 30m-50m gal/year, Holmgren said. The plant would cost around $2.50/gal in ethanol equivalent, or $75m125m (60m100m), with the steel operator putting up the capital cost, she noted. LanzaTech first plans to have a commercial fuel ethanol plant in commission in China by the end of 2013. We are expecting our demonstration plant with Baosteel to achieve its target productivity and process stability by the end of summer, said Holmgren. After this we are ready to set up a commercial ethanol plant, which will take up to 18 months. It would be reasonable to have demonstrated our ability to produce 2,3 BDO by the end of 2013, start commercializing in 2014, and by the end of 2014 achieve commercial production, she added. LanzaTech would license the technology and share profits or losses in the product sales. The 2,3 BDO market is currently very limited because of the difficulty of separating the intermediate into downstream derivatives such as BD, methyl ethyl ketone (MEK) and butenes, said Holmgren. As the Baosteel ethanol demonstration plant in China is now up and running, the ethanol produced in the facility will be used internally for its car fleet as well as for sample demonstration to LanzaTechs partners, said Holmgren. LanzaTech expects another 100,000 gal/year fuel ethanol demonstration plant to start in September 2012 in collaboration with steel producer Shougang Group. The ethanol facility is next to one of Shougangs steel mills in China. If we use the steel industrys CO emissions worldwide, it could produce up to 30bn gal/year of ethanol, Holmgren said. Holmgren sees steel mills as major sources of CO. They produce CO as an off-gas and either flare it off or use it to produce power.

Weve done quite a bit of work and if we are right, we could commercialize very, very quickly
JENNIfER hOLMgREN CEO, LanzaTech

ECONOMIC SEPARATION LanzaTech and its partner, USbased Orochem Technologies, believe they have a separation route that can economically convert LanzaTechs carbon monoxide-based 2,3 BDO into MEK or 1,3 butadiene using a thermocatalytic process. Holmgren said data from the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) as part of a US Department of Energy project show that the conversions are feasible. LanzaTech has been working with PNNL since late 2010 to optimize the conversion process. 2,3 BDO is currently available as a laboratory chemical and is being sold as a small-volume intermediate for certain niche applications such as in food flavoring additives. In the past, 2,3 BDO was used as a feedstock to make butadiene for synthetic rubber, before it was abandoned in favor of a more costeffective naphtha-based BD. We think we can separate and convert 2,3 BDO cheaply enough to justify using this as a bulk intermediate, said Holmgren. Weve done quite a bit of work and if we are right, since its our same organism and reactor, we could commercialize very, very quickly, she added. LanzaTech aims to ramp up CObased ethanol production through several demonstration plants that are expected to start up this year.

ALTERNATIVE SOURCES Other sources of CO include industrial facilities particularly fertilizer and mining operations as well as chemical sites. In India, LanzaTech has partnered with Concord Enviro Systems (CES) for a 100,000 gal/year fuel ethanol demonstration plant using municipal solid waste for feedstock. The companies expect the ethanol plant to begin start-up in December 2012. In the US, the company purchased a biorefinery in Soperton, Georgia, this year from bankrupt cellulosic ethanol producer Range Fuels. Holmgren said LanzaTech plans to leverage the facilities existing gasification technology to produce biofuels and chemicals.
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24 | ICIS Chemical Business | June 4-10, 2012

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