Demonstration of the technological concept of the techno-economic and environmental viability of a Biorefinery for advanced biofuels exclusively from forest residues.

Forest occupies about 35% of the Portuguese mainland territory and supplies raw material for various industrial activities, including pulp and paper production, contributing to 2% of national GDP. Thus, it will be crucial to ensure the sustainability of this sector, with the creation of new forest-base value chains in the context of advanced biorefineries, within the scope of the bioeconomy and circular economy.

Thereby, BIO4PORTUGAL project aims to demonstrate the technological concept of ethanol production, as advanced liquid biofuel, from Eucalyptus forest/industrial residues, involving a Consortium of three Promoters – LNEG, RAIZ (R&D center of the The Navigator Company) and PETROGAL.

The workplan of BIO4PORTUGAL will be based on the construction and operation of a complete and integrated demonstration unit of bioethanol production technology. The process for conversion of residual lignocellulosic biomass will involve a deconstruction step followed by enzymatic hydrolysis to obtain sugars for the formulation of the culture medium to be used in fermentation with new 2nd generation recombinant yeasts developed by the LNEG team, and afterwards the bioethanol will be recovered by distillation. This infrastructure for advanced biofuels, located at LNEG and unique in Portugal, will be made available in the future to national companies.

Project duration: 01/03/2021-31/08/2022.

Co-funded by: FAI – Fundo de Apoio à Inovação (Aviso 06/2019 – Economia circular, Valorização de resíduos no contexto da Transição Energética)