Art Ragauskas

Since the beginning of the new millennium, we have witnessed an ever-increasing merger of technical, economical and societal demands for sustainable technologies. Indeed, hardly a day does not pass in which the issues of energy security, climate change, cradle-to-cradle product development are discussed in public and professional forums. The need to convert biomass into fuels and chemicals was one of mankind’s earliest drivers for chemical and biochemical research. Indeed, at the turn of the century most industrial materials including dyes, inks, paints, and synthetic fibers were made from trees and/or agricultural crops. Yet, by the late 1960’s most of these chemical biobased processes had been displaced by petroleum. The energy crisis of the 1970’s renewed interest and need to develop new chemical technologies that were no longer depended upon petroleum reserves. In the decades that followed, research priorities directed at bio-derived fuels and chemicals were diminished as petroleum supply/demand curves were satisfactorily addressed. Nonetheless, the overall global demand for liquid fuels has almost doubled over the past 30 years and demand will continue to increase as several developing nations pursue aggressive economic growth policies. Clearly, continued growth in demand for finite petroleum resources is not a long term viable solution, let alone the environmental and societal effects associated with increased utilization of fossil-fuels.

The shifting of society’s dependency from petroleum resources to renewable biomass resources has been proposed to have several positive ramifications including enhanced energy security and improved environmental performance parameters including net reductions in CO2 emissions.

At the cornerstone of this green industrial revolution is the integrated biorefinery. This is a biomass processing facility that integrates our ability to tailor biomass productivity and processability with conversion processes, and the equipment to produce a range of fuels, power, and chemicals from biomass. It fully utilizes all components of biomass to make a range of foods, fuels, chemicals, feeds, materials, heat and power in proportions that maximizes sustainable, economic development. As such, this vision seeks to develop a new bio-based economy that will initially supplement today’s petroleum economy and, as these non-renewable resources are consumed, become the primary resource for fuels, chemicals and materials which is a key challenge that today’s young scientists and engineers will need address.

This presentation will examine how research in advanced biofuel and biomaterials derived from renewable biomass systems will address these key technological challenges including:

Ø New biopolymer pretreatment chemistries for biofuels

Ø Innovative applications of plant biopolymers for films and foams.

Ø Advanced thermal treatments for the production of biofuels and chemicals.

Many of these challenges were technically insurmountable in the 1970’s, however the revolution in plant genomics, biotechnology, lignocellulosic chemistry, process chemistry/engineering, nanotechnology, catalyst chemistry and computational modeling/simulation over the past 30 years provides a rational path forward to completing the conversion of modern society to the bio-based economy. Learning and mastering these tools will provide today's students the opportunity to reshape our world into one in which development and sustainability are interweaved into each other for a better and greener future.