Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

The traditional waste management system of using and disposing contributes to the depletion of raw resources, the exhaustion of sites suitable for landfilling, the dispersion of toxic materials in the environment, and the generation of greenhouse gases. As a result, mimicking nature, the concept of "circular economy" has been proposed, aiming at maintaining the utility of products, co-products and wastes and retain their value by utilizing the outputs of one process as the input to another, leading to zero-waste solutions and closed-loop systems. Often the most fertile areas of discovery and innovation lie at the intersection of traditional disciplines. Therefore, the proposed research aims at discovering and studying the integration opportunities of bio- and thermo-conversion to find new solutions and maximize environmental and economic benefits and contribute to the "circular economy". The long-term goal of the Discovery grant is the development of solutions to produce value-added energy and chemicals from a variety of different sustainable feedstocks of low or negative value. The short-term goals include the investigation of a synergistic combination and integration of technologies for advanced reaction and separation processes, aimed at valorizing both liquid and solid products, focusing on optimizing multiple uses of pyrolytic bio-char as a key contributor to the circular economy. These objectives will be achieved through 4 projects addressing (1) the pyrolytic conversion of the lignin-rich anaerobic digestion solid residues (digestate) into quality bio-char and phenolic-rich bio-oil; (2) the bio-conversion of the aqueous pyrolysis product fraction, separated by fractional condensation, into methane by anaerobic digestion; (3) the use of raw and modified bio-chars as adsorbents of contaminants from the gaseous (carbon dioxide and H2S) and liquid effluents (toxic metals, pharmaceuticals, hormones,..) of the anaerobic digestion process and for other potential uses as value-added materials (catalysts, fillers, electrical components, food and feed additives,.); and (4) the use of bio-char to optimize the anaerobic digestion process by reducing inhibition and creating optimal environments for bacterial activity. It is expected that new conversion pathways will be discovered which will be transferred to the benefits of both the scientific community and industry, generating economic and environmental value, while educating and training well prepared HQP.