JBI International

The art of refining liquid hydrocarbons (crude oil) into diesel, gasoline, and fuel oils was commercially scaled decades ago. Unfortunately, refineries are technologically limited to accepting only a very narrow range of liquid hydrocarbons with very specific properties and minimal contaminates. Unrecyclable, hydrocarbon-based waste is a significant environmental problem increasing every year. According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2010 Facts and Figures report, over 92% of waste plastic is not recycled and with a growth rate of approximately 8% per year, there exists a critical need for a viable and environmentally sound, general purpose hydrocarbon-based recycling process. Hydrocarbon streams that fall outside of accepted refinery standards have traditionally been landfilled or melted into products of low value. The barriers and challenges are so great that previous attempts to refine waste plastics into fuel resulted in unviable batch-based machines producing low-value, unstable mixed fuels. However, over the course of three years JBI, Inc. (“JBI”) has broken through these barriers and has designed and built a viable commercial-scale continuous refinery capable of processing a wide-range of hydrocarbon-based waste into ASTM specification fuels. Research and testing of scale-up through 1-gallon, 3000 gallon, multi-kiln, and 40 ton/day processors took place in a plant in Niagara Falls, NY. Technical challenges encountered and lessons learned during process development will be explained in detail. In 2009, our technology was “molecularly audited” by IsleChem, LLC (“IsleChem”) of Grand Island, NY and in 2012, the full-scale plant was viably validated by SAIC Energy, Environment & Infrastructure, LLC (“SAIC”). Numerous sources of waste plastic and users of the resulting fuel products conducted extensive audits of the technology, process, and plant. For the purpose of this paper, processing of waste plastics will be discussed in detail; however, this technology can be applied to other waste hydrocarbon-based materials such as contaminated monomers, waste oils, lubricants and other composite waste streams.

Low temperature and long residence time pretreatments have been proposed as an alternative to conventional pretreatments within a centralized biorefinery, allowing for a decentralized pretreatment without high energy costs. Ammonia fiber expansion (AFEX™) pretreatment may be uniquely suitable for decentralized pretreatment, and this study considers the possibility of decreasing the temperature in AFEX pretreatment of corn stover. AFEX pretreatment at 40°C and 8 h produced comparable sugar and ethanol yields as conventional AFEX pretreatment at high temperatures and short residence time during subsequent hydrolysis and fermentation. Increasing the ammonia loading at these temperatures tends to increase digestibility, although the moisture content of the reaction has little effect. This study suggests a greater flexibility in AFEX pretreatment conditions than previously thought, allowing for an alternative approach for decentralized facilities if the economic conditions are appropriate.

A process was developed to fractionate corn fiber into glucose- and pentose-rich fractions. Corn fiber was ammonia fiber explosion treated at 90 degrees C, using 1 g anhydrous ammonia pergram of drybiomass, 60% moisture, and 30-min residence time. Twenty four hour hydrolysis of ammonia fiber explosion-treated corn fiber with cellulase converted 83% of available glucanto-glucose. In this hydrolysis the hemicellulose was partially broken down with 81% of the xylan and 68% of the arabinan being contained in the hydrolysate after filtration to remove lignin and other insoluble material. Addition of ethanol was used to precipitate and recover the solubilized hemicellulose from the hydrolysate, followed by hydrolysis with 2% (v/v) sulfuric acid to convert the recovered xylan and arabinan to monomeric sugars. Using this method, 57% of xylose and 54% of arabinose available in corn fiber were recovered in a pentose-rich stream. The carbohydrate composition of the pentose-enriched stream was 5% glucose, 57% xylose, 27% arabinose, and 11% galactose. The carbohydrate composition of the glucose-enriched stream was 87% glucose, 5% xylose, 6% arabinose, and 1% galactose, and contained 83% of glucose available from the corn fiber.

Many plants increase in freezing tolerance in response to low, nonfreezing temperatures, a phenomenon known as cold acclimation. Cold acclimation in Arabidopsis involves rapid cold-induced expression of the C-repeat/dehydration-responsive element binding factor (CBF) transcriptional activators followed by expression of CBF-targeted genes that increase freezing tolerance. Here, we present evidence for a CBF cold-response pathway in Brassica napus. We show that B. napus encodes CBF-like genes and that transcripts for these genes accumulate rapidly in response to low temperature followed closely by expression of the cold-regulated Bn115 gene, an ortholog of the Arabidopsis CBF-targeted COR15a gene. Moreover, we show that constitutive overexpression of the Arabidopsis CBF genes in transgenic B. napus plants induces expression of orthologs of Arabidopsis CBF-targeted genes and increases the freezing tolerance of both nonacclimated and cold-acclimated plants. Transcripts encoding CBF-like proteins were also found to accumulate rapidly in response to low temperature in wheat (Triticum aestivum L. cv Norstar) and rye (Secale cereale L. cv Puma), which cold acclimate, as well as in tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum var. Bonny Best, Castle Mart, Micro-Tom, and D Huang), a freezing-sensitive plant that does not cold acclimate. An alignment of the CBF proteins from Arabidopsis, B. napus, wheat, rye, and tomato revealed the presence of conserved amino acid sequences, PKK/RPAGRxKFxETRHP and DSAWR, that bracket the AP2/EREBP DNA binding domains of the proteins and distinguish them from other members of the AP2/EREBP protein family. We conclude that components of the CBF cold-response pathway are highly conserved in flowering plants and not limited to those that cold acclimate.

Biphenyl was readily degraded and mineralized to CO2 and CH4 by a PCB-dechlorinating anaerobic microbial consortium. Degradation occurred when biphenyl was supplied as a sole source of carbon or as a co-metabolic substrate together with glucose and methanol. p-Cresol was detected and confirmed by mass spectroscopy as a transient intermediate. Production of 14 C-CO2 and 14C-CH4 from 14C-biphenyl was observed in the approximate ratio of 1:2. The results indicated the existence of novel pathways for biphenyl degradation in a natural anaerobic microbial community.

A polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB)-dechlorinating anaerobic microbial consortium, developed in a granular form, demonstrated extensive dechlorination of PCBs present in Raisin River sediments at room (20° to 22°C) and at a relatively low (12°C) temperature. Highly chlorinated PCB congeners were dechlorinated and less chlorinated compounds were produced. The homolog comparison showed that tri-, tetra-, penta-, hexa-, and heptachlorobiphenyl compounds decreased significantly, and mono- and dichlorobiphenyl compounds increased. After 32 weeks of incubation at 12°C, the predominant less chlorinated products included 2-, 4-, 2-2/26-, 24-, 2-4-, 24-2-, 26-2-, and 26-4-CB. Among these, 24- and 24-2-CB did not accumulate at room temperature, suggesting a further dechlorination of these congeners. Predominantly meta dechlorination (i.e., pattern M) was catalyzed by the microbial consortium in the granules. Dechlorination in the control studies without granules was not extensive. This study is the first demonstration of enhanced reductive dechlorination of sediment PCBs by an exogenous anaerobic microbial consortium. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Biotechnol Bioeng 55: 182–190, 1997.