Ethanol has the potential of significantly reducing the United State dependence on foreign oil. From every barrel of oil (40 gals) approximately 20 gallons of gasoline is produced.

Modern automobiles can burn a mixture of gasoline ranging between 12% and 85% ethanol combined with 88% gasoline and 15% gasoline, E-12 and E-85.
Currently there are approximately 3.5 billion gallons of ethanol produced in the United States a year. Over 99% of this ethanol uses corn grain as the starting material.

Colusa Biomass Energy Corporation (CBMG) has a US patent that can use cellulose (woody portion of all plant life) to produce ethanol; the starting material for the CBMG process are rice straw and rice hulls, corn stover and cobs, wheat straw and husks, wood chips from forest slashing, and sawdust from saw mills. How much ethanol can be produced from these cellulose-based raw materials? Using 2003 farm data from the US Department of Agriculture and taking into consideration the availability of these cellulose based materials, it has been conservatively estimated that over 1.0 trillion gallons of ethanol could be produced per year. This would reduce the importation of oil by an estimated 75%. CBMG will initially build a 50,000 ton/yr rice straw plant near Colusa, CA. This plant will produce 6.25 million gallons of fuel ethanol, 8,000 tons of silica products, Distillers’ Dried Grain Solubles (DDGS), commercial carbon dioxide, and a high energy lignin fuel that will be used internally in the plant to reduce the cost of natural gas.


Comparisons between our system and traditional spiral wound membrane systems

A spiral wound membrane, both RO and UF; this increases the surface area of the membrane winding a membrane/separator system into the shape of a log. Due to the membrane/separator proximities spiral wound membranes are “plugged” by particulate matter in the feed liquid.

The CBMG system differs from the spiral wound systems by placing the membrane directly in contact with the feed liquid and pumping this feed liquid at a high flow rate. This flow rate acts to “sweep” the membrane and prevents “plugging.”

The niche that CBMG systems can fill is its ability to filter thixotropic (viscous) Newtonian and non-Newtonian liquids. For example, CBMG UF system can take tomato juice (Newtonian liquid) and by removing the water, produce tomato paste (non-Newtonian liquid.)

Potential applications of the CBMG reverse osmosis/ultrafiltration systems are:

• Metal Finishing: Chromic Acid, Copper Pyrophosphate, Nickel Sulfamate, Nickel Fluoborate, Zinc Chloride;
  
  
• Water Soluble Oil & Synthetic Lubricant Coolants: Removal from waste water, 99.9% recovery;
  
  
• Latex and Latex Paint (Wash water); Concentration & Recovery, Purification of Water for reuse;
  
  
• Sea and Brackish Water (Desalination): Single stage sea and brackish water conversion to potable water for off-shore operations, hotels, islands, and exploration sites;
  
  
• Food, Dairy, and Beverage: Cottage and Cheddar Cheese Whey, Soy and other protein Extractions, Milk, Citrus and other Juice Concentrates, By-Product Recovery (Currently FTC’s RO/UF is not Food & Drug Administration (FDA) approved, but all materials have been approved by the FDA and a minimum of expense and effort will be required to get FDA approval.)
  
  
• Pulp and Paper: Water Recovery & Reuse, Removal of Color and other BOD, Recovery & Concentration of Other By-Products, Separation of Polysaccharides from Lignosulfonates, “Black Liquor” recovery of Processing Chemicals & Concentration of Lignin;
  
  
• Chemical & Metallurgical: Purification of high molecular weight, organic and inorganic elements & compounds; Fractionation of multi-compound solutions, removal of colloidal and macromolecular impurities;
  
  
• Textile & Dye: Textile color removal
  
  
• Waste Treatment & Water Reuse: In packing houses, fish-FPC, chemical, plating, mining, sewage, food, diary, yeast, etc.
  
  
• Oil Spill Cleanup: In a combination sweep/process plant, FTC can collect oil spilled on an ocean, lake or river remove the water and recover the oil.

Our ultrafiltration (UF) can be cast to do total rejection of 5,000 to 20,000 molecular weight (MW) molecules. For example, large molecules (lignin), enzymes, bacteria, lactose, colloidal matter, fine suspended particulate matter, and proteins will not pass through the membrane.

We have designed and engineered a Potable Water unit that will produce between 200 – 500 gallons/day of disease-free potable water. This unit will operate from electrical power generated on-site and requires no electrical power.


Short Abstract for US Patent 5,735,916
UNITED STATES PATENT Patent Number: 5,735,916
Lucas et al. Date of Patent: Apr. 7, 1998

PROCESS FOR PRODUCTION OF LIGNIN FUEL, ETHYL ALCOHOL, CELLULOSE, SILICA/SILICATES, AND CELLULOSE DERIVATIES FROM PLANT BIOMASS

References Cited
U.S. Patent Documents

4,797,135 1/1989 Kubat et al.
5,114,541 5/1992 Bayer
5,186,722 2/1993 Cantrell et al.

ABSTRACT
This invention relates to a series of treatments, both physical and chemical, to plant biomass resulting in the production of ethanol, lignin, and a high protein animal feed supplement. In plants having a high silica content, a fourth product is obtained, silica/caustic oxide (silicates solution, waterglass.) Both 5-Carbon and 6-Carbon sugars are fermented to ethanol using an existing closed-loop fermentation system employing a genetically engineered thermophylic bacteria developed by Agrol, Ltd. The lignin and absolute ethanol are mixed producing a high-energy fuel.

5 Claims, No Drawings
PROCESS FOR PRODUCTION OF LIGNIN FUEL,
ETHYL ALCOHOL, CELLULOSE,
SILICA/SILICATES, AND CELLULOSE
DERIVATIVES FROM PLANT BIOMASS

This application is a continuation in part of application Ser. No. 08/460,493, filed Jul. 13, 1995, now abandoned.


FIELD OF THE INVENTIONThe invention relates to a method for producing lignin fuel (a mixture of lignin and ethyl alcohol), silica/sodium oxide, cellulose, and other cellulose derivatives from plant biomass.


BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Description of Prior Art

The production of ethyl alcohol (ethanol) from 5-carbon and 6-carbon sugars has recently focused on the development of genetically engineered organisms. Prior to the work done in genetic engineering, considerable work was done with organisms, extraction of hydrolytic enzymes for cellulose and hemicellulose. B. S. Montencourt and D. E. Eveleigh, 1978, discussed producing fuels from plant biomass.

Delignification was done by Wilkes, et al., 1983 using chlorine dioxide/acetic acid solution.

Kubat et al, U.S. Pat. No. 4,797,135 describes a method of treating plant biomass with a weak caustic solution to produce a highly comminuted flour of wood and other vegetable biomass suitable for the use as fuel.

Many pretreatment technologies for the conversion of plant biomass, generally agricultural by-products (residues), have been developed in the past. The following institutions have provided work in plant biomass fuels:

The U.S. Army Natick Development Command, The University of California, Berkeley, Department of Engineering, The Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, and The Indiana Institute of Technology (Spano, et al) The U.S. Pat No. 4,399,009 (Haig, 1981) claims the conversion of biological materials to liquid fuels. This patent uses zeolite catalysts to convert plant hydrocarbons with a molecular weight of over 150 into lower molecular weight entities for use as a liquid fuel. A gasoline fuel extender (methyltetrahydrofuran, MTHF) has been derived from plant biomass. MTHF, up to 10%, has been added to gasoline as a replacement for tetraethyl lead. Generally, the production of alternative fuels has centered on aromatic compounds and is therefore relatively expensive. A fuel derived from a mixture of ethyl alcohol (ethanol) and a lignin extract using a strong caustic solvent is an economically viable engine fuel.


REFERENCES CITED
The references cited within the text are incorporated to the extent they supplement, explain, provide background for, or teach methodology technology, and compositions employed herein.

Hagg, W.O., Rodewald, P.G. and Weisz, P.B., U.S. Pat. No. 4,3000,009, Nov. 10, 1981 A method of converting biological materials to liquid fuels.

Montencourt, B. S. and Eveleigh, D. E., Proceedings of Second Annual Symposium on Fuels from Biomass, Vol. II, p 613. Renssseleaer. Describes strains of bacteria and fungi having cellulose hydrolytic capabilities

Humphrey, A. E. and E. J. Nolan Report to the Office of Technology Assessment, Biological Production of Liquid Fuels and Chemical Feedstocks. Govt. Printing Office,

(The Detailed Description of the
Invention with “mass flow AND mass-energy balance are not included in this long abstract.)

We claim:
A method for producing lignin fuel, silica/sodium oxide, cellulose, and cellulose derivatives from plant biomass comprising the steps of placing the plant biomass in a hammermill or ball mill and grinding the plant biomass to 45 to 55 mesh, feeding the reduced size biomass into the first counter-current extractor, admixing the biomass with a mild acid solvent solution of acetic, carbonic, hydrochloric, phosphoric, or sulfuric acid at a temperature between 40 and 60 degrees C. and a residence time between 50 and 70 minutes, withdrawing a solvent stream from the first counter-current extractor containing 5-carbon sugars, soluble plant proteins, and soluble polypeptides which is passed to a fermentation tank where the 5-carbon sugars are fermented to ethanol,

withdrawing a solid material stream from the first counter-current extractor and passing the solid material through a belt-press filter, dewatering the solid material to between 70% and 80% total solids, and feeding the dewatered solid material stream into a second counter-current extractor, admixing the solid material with a caustic hydroxide solution, dissolving the lignin and silica,

withdrawing a solvent stream from the second counter-current extractor containing the lignin and caustic silicate and passing the solvent to an ultrafiltration membrane system, separating and concentrating the lignin from the solvent containing the caustic solution,

withdrawing from the ultrafiltration membrane unit a caustic silicate solution whereby a silica caustic oxide solution is produced,

withdrawing between 10% and 20% of the caustic silicate solution from the ultrafiltration membrane unit and sending the caustic silicate solution to the caustic solvent added to the second counter-current extractor as a feed-back solvent,

withdrawing the solid stream from the second counter-current extractor and passing the solid stream to a washing centrifuge and passing the solid to a belt-press filter dewatering the solid to 75% total solids,

withdrawing the solid from the belt-press filter and passing the solid to a tank wherein the solid cellulose material is converted to a glucose steam using acid hydrolyzing enzymes,


Silica Uses in Industry
Abrasive Wheels
Absorbents
Adhesives
Asbestos Products
Bar Soap
Beater Sizing Paper
Bleaching Textiles and Paper
Boiler Compounds
Brick-Making
Briquetting
Coal
Glass
Ores
Buffering Agents
Building Materials
Cements
Ceramics
Cement Grouts
Chemical Grouting
Cleaning Compounds
Coagulant
Coatings
Enamel
Roofing Granules
Welding Rods
Concrete Cleaners
Concrete Treatment
Corrosion Control
Corrugated Board
Dairy Cleaners
Deflocculating of Clays
Dehumidifiers
De-inking Paper
Detergent Formulations
Dishwashing
Oil Drilling Fluids
Mud Additive
Silicate Base Mud
Synthetic Mud
Drum Washing
Earthwork Construction
Egg Washing
Fiber Drums
Fire resistant paint
Floor cleaners
Fly Ash Structural Materials
Foil laminating
Foundry
Cores
Hot Topes
Molds
Frits
Fruit & Vegetable Peeling
Ground Water Control
Heavy Duty Cleaning
Hog Scalding
Laminating Metal Foil
Laundry Operations
Leather Processing
Liquid Detergent
Lithographic Printing
Magnesium Trisilicate
Metal Cleaning
Molecular Sieves
Oil Refining
Oil Reclaiming
Ore Flotation
Paint & Rubber Fillers
Paints
Paper Coating
Paper Tube Winding
Pigments
Polishing Wheel Cement
Portland Cement
Poultry Processing
Radiator Compounds
Release Agent
Rust Remover
Sealing Containers
Scaling Metal Castings
Secondary Oil Recovery
Silica Gel
Aerogel
Hydrogel
Xerogel
Soap Conditioners
Soap-Making
Solid Fiberboard
Space Vehicle Paint
Steam Cleaning
Synthetic Catalysts
Synthetic Detergents
Textile Processing
Timed Fertilizers
Tire Cleaners
Titanium Dioxide
Ultramarine
Vegetable Oil Refining
Washing Locomotives
Water Clarification
Water Treatment
Wire Drawing
Zeolite (Synthetic)

The largest industrial uses of Silica/Sodium Oxide (Sodium Silicate) are in the Paper Industry; the Pap Products (de-inking, paper tubes, etc.); Detergent & Soap producers, Producers of Gels, Catalysts and Zeolites; Foundries in the production of molds, etc.; Soil Stabilization; Silica Sols, Water Treatment, and Coatings.