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MOOC Biorefinery: From Biomass to Building Blocks of Biobased Products
Learn how to design an effective biorefinery to obtain valuable components from various biobased feedstocks such as plants, organisms and waste streams.
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Why follow this course?
The use of fossil resources is a controversial topic and there is much scientific research to argue against their use for energy, chemicals, and in the production of almost every product. Because of this, we're seeing a huge shift towards sustainable biobased and renewable resources and away from fossil-based ones. In this new world, it’s critical to know how to efficiently and effectively obtain valuable elements from biomass.
Join this course and gain the latest academic knowledge on biorefinery which can be applied to their ongoing studies or to advance their careers.
Just as the petrochemical refinery is a crucial part of the fossil-based industry, so is the biorefinery for the biobased industry. In a biorefinery, a complex biobased feedstock is separated and processed in such a way to maximize sustainability and application opportunities.
Upon completing this course, you will understand the tools and techniques needed to efficiently disentangle, separate and convert different biomass based feedstocks into simpler (functional) components. First, you'll learn about available techniques and processes for biomass activation, disentanglement and separation. Next, you’ll explore how to design a biorefinery taking into account feedstock and sustainable energy use and dive into:
- Mass and energy balances
- Design of biorefinery process units to obtain multiple products from one type of biomass
- How to recover energy and resources in the biorefinery system
- Evaluation of the designed system with respect to sustainability and economic criteria
- Evaluation of criteria for successful implementation
What you will learn
- Choose proper (chemical) pre-treatment and conversions to arrive at the required products
- Conceptually design a biorefinery process
- Critically evaluate a process design with respect to energy and feedstock efficiency
- Compare that design with fossil-based processes
- Know how to activate/disentangle and separate biobased feedstocks
MicroMasters® Programme Chemistry and Technology for Sustainability
You can follow this MOOC separately but it is also part of the MicroMasters Programme Chemistry and Technology for Sustainability, which is a programme that enables you to discover new resources and help your company make the switch from fossil to renewable, biobased resources.