Biochemicals from Pyrolysis

Syngas from biomass pyrolysis may contain hundreds of different biochemical substances. Some of these can be quite valuable and therefore simply using the syngas for energy can be rather wasteful. Depending on the amount of syngas produced, it may then be worthwhile to separate out the highly complex biochemicals from simple compounds (e.g. methane, carbon monoxide).

• The syngas is first cooled down for distillation (water, external air as coolant). Simple, low-tech, open-source methods of separation are needed.
• Biological methods for catalysis of CO and H to ethanol have been described (e.g. Coskata)
• Big question is: can this scale DOWN to village-scale ?

Possible Applications

• Pharmaceuticals
• Bioplastics