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Energy Initiatives: Not Pulp Fiction
Gasifying Black Liquor Provides Pulp Mills with a Way to Produce Syngas
A CryoGas International Staff Report
2009.04
If pulp mills worldwide were to adopt black liquor gasification technology, they could potentially replace the equivalent of over 45 billion liters a year of gasoline globally. That is two percent of global fuel demand, according to the US Department of Energy (DOE). For pulp mills, those figures represent a potential source of additional revenue. For the industrial gas industry, the use of gasification technologies represents a huge market opportunity for the supply of oxygen.

Late last year, the DOE awarded the New-Page Corporation (www.newpagecorp.com) $300,000 to conduct a $1.2 million feasibility study for incorporating a black liquor-based biorefinery developed by Chemrec (www.chemrec.se) into their pulp and paper mill in Escanaba, MI. NewPage is an Ohio-based paper company. Chemrec is a Swedish company with proprietary gasification technology that enables the conversion of black liquor, a liquid biomass by-product of pulp mills, into renewable motor fuels, biomaterials, or electricity. The DOE is a major provider of funding for basic and applied research for converting biomass resources into biofuels.

If the feasibility study at NewPage’s Escanaba pulp and paper mill determines that the Chemrec technology is economically viable, the installation of this gasification system would lead to large-scale production of second generation biofuels. The co-production of biofuels would represent a new revenue stream to NewPage and improve the Company’s return of capital at the pulp and paper mill.

US Ambassador to Sweden Michael M. Wood first announced this award at the Sweden-Michigan Clean Energy Summit: Driving to Energy Independence in Detroit, MI in September of 2008. The Summit discussed the challenges and strategies of the drive to energy independence. Chemrec CEO Jonas Rudberg, who also participated in the Clean Energy Summit, declared, “Our gasification technology is already proven with two plants in operation, one first-generation commercial plant in New Bern, NC in the US, and a second-generation development plant in Piteå, Sweden. We are currently working with the NewPage mill and a leading pulp and paper firm in Sweden to develop the first industrial scale second-generation plants and are very appreciative of the support provided by the US Department of Energy. There is no comparable technology in the market, and we have a great opportunity to position Chemrec as the leader in pulp and paper mill based biorefineries.”

Department of Energy Deputy Assistant Secretary David Rodgers, another speaker at the Clean Energy Summit, commented, “This feasibility study is a first step in exploring the possibilities of technology that could expand biorefinery applications and biofuel production into the forest products industry. We look forward to continued opportunities for working with our Swedish colleagues to advance alternative energy and reduce international dependence on imported fossil fuels.”

Activities such as this study were encouraged by the “Implementing Arrangement for Cooperation in Renewable Energy,” signed between the United States and Sweden in June 2007. The initial agreement between Chemrec and NewPage was signed in Stockholm in August 2007.

According to information published on the Chemrec’s website, “Black liquor is a biomass feedstock with unique properties and is available at existing industrial sites in large quantities. As black liquor is a liquid, it canbe pumped into a pressurized gasifier and it is easy to atomize into a fine mist that reacts very fast in the gasifier. The gasification of black liquor char is more rapid than for other feedstocks as the inherently high sodium and potassium content of black liquor acts as a catalyst. These properties make it possible to apply the high temperature, entrained flow gasification principle to black liquor.”

Gasifying black liquor provides pulp mills with a way to recover a by-product and at the same time produce syngas for biofuels production. Chemrec claims its gasification process has advantages over alternative gasification technologies including greater speed, production of high quality syngas, and complete carbon conversion. According to Chemrec, its gasification process also has a substantially higher thermal efficiency than the process it replaces, the Tomlinson recovery boiler. By using the available black liquor for raw material supply in the gasification process, this technology can reduce a pulp and paper mill’s net energy costs. In addition, this process does not use raw materials that compete for food or agricultural land, making it more sustainable.

To learn more about DOE’s support of biofuels projects, visit the Biomass Program Past Solicitations Web page: http://www1.eere.energy.gov/biomass/past_ solicitations.html. For more information on Chemrec’s Gasification process visitwww.chemrec.se

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