title: Bio-refinery as the bio-inspired process to bulk chemicals.
abstract: This paper describes several examples of knowledge-intensive technologies for the production of chemicals from biomass, which take advantage of the biomass structure in a more efficient way than the production of fuels or electricity alone. The depletion in fossil feedstocks, increasing oil prices, and the ecological problems associated with CO(2) emissions are forcing the development of alternative resources for energy, transport fuels, and chemicals, such as the replacement of fossil resources with CO(2) neutral biomass. Allied with this is the conversion of crude oil products utilizes primary products (ethylene, etc.) and their conversion into either materials or (functional) chemicals with the aid of co-reagents such as ammonia, by various process steps to introduce functionalities such as -NH(2) into the simple structures of the primary products. Conversely, many products found in biomass often contain functionalities. Therefore, it is attractive to exploit this in order to by-pass the use, and preparation of, co-reagents as well as to eliminate various process steps by utilizing suitable biomass-based precursors for the production of chemicals.
authors.affiliation: Wageningen University and Research Centre, Department of Valorisation of Plant Production Chains, P.O. Box 17, 6700 AA Wageningen, The Netherlands. johan.sanders@wur.nl
authors.forename: Johan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sanders
authors.forename: Elinor
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Scott
authors.forename: Ruud
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Weusthuis
authors.forename: Hans
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Mooibroek
mesh_terms: D018533:Biomass; D001709:Biotechnology / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends*; D002482:Cellulose / Q000737:chemistry; D002617:Chemical Industry / Q000191:economics / Q000639:trends*; D005029:Ethylenediamines / Q000737:chemistry; D005285:Fermentation; D008031:Lignin / Q000737:chemistry; D015394:Molecular Structure; D009426:Netherlands; D010940:Plant Proteins / Q000737:chemistry; D010944:Plants / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D005029:Ethylenediamines; D010940:Plant Proteins; C036909:lignocellulose; C031234:ethylenediamine; D002482:Cellulose; D008031:Lignin