如何使用催化从生物量有效生产化学品？

在第一官方的职场世界创造力和创新日，我们向Topsoe的R＆D Director询问了Esben Taarning，R＆D Director，他在生化中的创新工作以及该地区的未来可能性。

You recently won the prestigiousTorkil Holm奖为了您的杰出贡献生物质算法可持续和催化方法的发展。C你解释了你在生物的化学物质内的创新是什么？

In my research, I’ve been trying to find out how to efficiently use biomass as a feedstock to produce everyday products, for example plastic bottles, that today come mostly from fossil fuels. The challenge was to find a proper catalyst that enables efficient conversion of sugars to useful products. It was a true detective hunt: we had to try out materials with different catalytic properties and different process types and see which ones would work better, and, as the prize reflects, we’ve had some success.

但是这个创新是如何？

Take a look at our recentpartnership with Braskem for production of MEG（单亚乙二醇），宠物的关键组分。在我们试图商业化的过程中，我们服用糖，将其切成较小的作品，可以轻松处理并变成生物塑料。我们目前正在研究演示工厂，以证明这是商业上可行的。

Once it is successfully demonstrated, you can envision completely new value chains emerge within the production of chemicals. The agricultural sector will supply bio-refineries with biomass which will convert it into sugars. That can be then converted via Topsoe’s technology by companies such as Braskem.

Biomass has the potential to become an advantageous feedstock over oil for the production of certain chemicals, since it has a lot of chemical functionality that can be reused or slightly altered, provided the right catalytic process is invented. This can reduce the number of needed process steps compared to using oil. However, it is also clear that that not all chemicals can be made efficiently from biomass and it is important to focus on those chemicals where biomass can compete.

如何帮助解决一些环境挑战？

通过减少过程步骤的数量并使用每年可再生的原料，这些新工艺可以导致最终产品的较小的环境足迹。此外，它还可以为不太富有石油的国家和地区创造出色的发展机会，例如巴西，泰国，甚至欧洲。这只是一个开始！也许在未来，我们将能够将生物量转换为今天不存在的新的和有用的构建块，或者从石油生产太贵了？由于糖，很多可能会改变。

为什么糖？

糖构成75%的生物量,be obtained from many different sources such as cane, beet, corn, and even wood and straw can be processed into sugars that can be converted to chemicals. There’s an abundance of sugar in the world and every year the agriculture gets more and more efficient. Today, around 150 million tons of sugar are used every year to produce ethanol for gasoline substitution. In the future, there might not be such a vast need for liquid fuels so maybe it will make more sense economically and environmentally to use it to replace the oil that is used for chemicals production.

这绝对是我们的新领域，但我们必须进入新的领域，并在未来发展脚进入门口。此外，我们现在的事项与商业之间有许多相似之处，并且该过程看起来像糖一样，所以我们可以清楚地使用我们的专业知识。我们基本上利用我们的核心竞争力在新地区开发。

这对业务意味着什么？

Our technology will be useful to produce several different chemicals from biomass. For the case of梅格，这是一个完善的化学产品，我们可以预测未来的增长，市场的商品性质与我们活跃的其他领域类似。对于我们正在寻找的其他化学品，特别是新化学品，特别是没有一个大型既定市场，情况是不同的，我们需要与其他公司讨论可能的应用和市场发展。这些不确定性也有更多的不确定性，而且更多的可能性，因为这些新化学品可能具有高价值以及有用但无法探索的财产。这种可能性基本上是无穷无尽的：例如，可以用生物塑料制作您的屏幕保护手机，与鞋子的鞋底相同。

我们认为兴趣是价值链的极端，也是最终用户之间的极端。例如，造纸行业 - 当我们使用较少和更少的纸张时，他们调查了新的可能性，例如将木材转化为糖，等等。许多公司希望使其价值链环保。

We’re still defining our role in the whole process. In general, we want to have the best solutions for transforming sugar feedstocks to chemicals using catalysis. We’re looking for partners at either the feedstock end or the chemicals end of the value chain who are willing to invest money and time into a future solution. We need skilled partners who understand the challenges and are ready to face them with us. The benefit can be significant if we dare to try.

How do you see innovation personally and how does it work in Topsoe?

To me, innovation starts when you have an idea with a potential to solve a real problem. Team effort is of course required, and I think we’re very good at that in Topsoe. Collectively, we have so much knowledge across the company and, through the daily work with colleagues and partners, we put that knowledge into good use in developing new solutions. I think it is a very fun and creative way to work and every day I learn something new.