Oral Presentation 1-00

 

Biomass Conversion to Ethanol:  Overview of DOE Research and Development

 

Gerson Santos-Leon, Valerie Sarisky-Reed

 

Biofuels Program, Office of Transportation Technologies

U.S. Department of Energy

 

E-mail:  gerson.santos-leon@ee.doe.gov

 

The Biofuels Program in the DOE Office of Transportation Technologies is a multidisciplinary bioenergy program dedicated to the development of technologies for the conversion of biomass into usable sugars for the production of ethanol and high value chemicals. The main areas of research are feedstock production, core biorefinery R&D (e.g. pretreatment, enzyme systems, advanced fermentation organisms), and systems integration. The program conducts the R&D in collaboration with industry, academia, and national laboratories.

 

An overview of the Office of Fuels Development biomass conversion R&D activities will be provided with special emphasis on our industrial partnership plan for the development of enzyme systems, yeast strains for the fermentation of biomass hydrolysates, and the demonstration of the sugars platform for the production of fuels and chemicals. The OFD is presently funding two multi-million dollar industrial partnerships for the development of enzyme systems for biomass conversion. The sugars platform demonstration strategy is aimed at the development of industrial partnerships to demonstrate an enzymatic hydrolysis platform to enable the biorefinery of the future. 

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