Current and planned bioenergy activities at
Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803
Prepared for
Southern Bioenergy Summit
February 27-28, 2007, Washington, DC
by
Martin A Hjortsø, Chemical Engineering
LSU, Baton Rouge, 70803
hjortso@lsu.edu, (225) 578-3058
The State and the University.
In Louisiana, sugarcane, rice, soybean, cotton, corn, hay, sorghum, and wheat are
grown on approximately 3.5 MM acres. These crops produce large quantities of
agricultural residues such as bagasse, corn stover, and rice husks. Most of these residues
are now inefficiently burnt, either in the field or for steam generation. A vigorous
bioprocessing industry would utilize these resources more efficiently and with less
adverse environmental impart. A wide range of energy crops is needed to create a viable
biofuel industry. With too few crops, the associated value-added compounds will be
overproduced, depressing their price and destroying the process economics. The diverse
climatic and soil conditions across Louisiana and the location at the mouth of the
Mississippi make the state well suited for cultivation and processing of energy crops to
support a bioprocessing industry.
The state’s chemical industry is the largest single employer in the manufacturing
sector. Nearly 26,000 Louisianans are directly employed in the chemical industry at an
average annual salary of $73,200, and that does not include thousands of contract and
maintenance employees that work at the plants year round. The Louisiana chemical
industry employees are among the best paid in the state, earning 53 percent more than the
state’s manufacturing average and 206 percent more than the state’s average wage. In
addition to the nearly 26,000 jobs directly created by the Louisiana chemical industry, for
every chemical industry job in Louisiana, 5.2 jobs are created in the state, a total of
approximately 135,000 additional jobs. In Louisiana alone, these jobs generate $5.9
billion in earnings and $125 million in state and local taxes on personal income.
Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge is a comprehensive, land grant
university located adjacent to the Mississippi river, close to downtown Baton Rouge. As
the primary, publicly funded research university in the state, it is usually designated as
the flag ship University of Louisiana. The University has 1,183 full time instructional
faculty members and offers 70 baccalaureate degree programs, 71 Master’s degree
programs and 54 Ph.D. degree programs. Enrolment figures for fall 2006 are shown in
the table below.
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Enrolment, fall 2006
Total
Agriculture
Basic Sciences
Engineering
Undergraduate
24,589
1,514
1,690
2,112
Graduate
4,728
448
556
466
LSU enrolment figures for fall 2006.
Total 2005-2006 expenditures in several important categories are shown below.
Instruction : $208,476,348
Research : $ 118,756,310
Public Service : $38, 860,764
Scholarships and fellowships : $ 53,752,367
Relevant Units.
Chemical Engineering
The research expertise of the faculty covers all classical areas of chemical
engineering, most of which are important to processing of biological materials.
Particularly relevant research interests and expertise include fermentation kinetics,
inorganic (catalytic) conversion of biomass, process design, waste management and
production of value added products from plant fibers. Current funding comes from
federal sources (NSF, DOE, NASA) and from industrial collaborators.
The Cain Chemical engineering department received a $10MM endowment in
1997 through the generosity of one of our alumni, Mr. Gordon Cain. This endowment
allowed the creation of five new Cain Chairs each valued at $2MM. One such Cain Chair
is presently available which the department is dedicating towards the alternative fuels
area to attract a prominent researcher to the department. The holder of this Chair will
have access to the entire interest derived annually from the LSU Foundation from the
investment of the $2MM. This interest can be used to support research, travel and other
personnel that the Chair would attract to his/her group. In addition, the accumulated
interest from this Chair since the State match will also be available to the holder of the
Chair.
Biological Sciences
This department has several faculty members with research interests closely
related to processing of biomaterials. One project is focused on insect-associated fungi and
past work has resulted in the discovery of more than thirty new species of wood decay
basidiomycetes and many additional species that are actually widespread in pantropical regions.
From the hindgut of passalid beetles (Odontotaenius disjunctus) xylose-fermenting yeast has been
isolated. It may be that the rare yeast trait of xylose fermentation is common to other woodingesting beetles and that all classes of gut organisms well-studied in termites will be shown to
occur and to have similar functions in most wood-ingesting organisms.
In another project, thermodynamic studies of the folding and stability of
extremophilic enzymes is complemented by functional characterization in different
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solution environments. The experience with handling and characterizing enzymes that
operate under extreme conditions will be directly applicable to students engineering new
cellulases.
The Biological Sciences Department also has a proposal with Conoco Philips for
a $210,200 project to support evaluation of algae as a biological source of renewable
energy. The project includes the study of algae as a source of ethanol production and
algae as a source of biomass to be fermented by other organism.
LSU Agricultural Center and Research and Extension Network
The LSU Agricultural Center has primary responsibilities for research and extension
programs related to agricultural and forested systems throughout the state of Louisiana. A task
force has been formed to develop a bio-based energy plan for the Center. At a summit
meeting held in April 2006 priority areas, resource requirement of and roadblocks to
development of a bio-based energy program in Louisiana were identified.
The top three areas in which the LSU Ag Center should play a significant role
were identified as electricity, ethanol and bio-diesel. In the ethanol area, efforts are
underway in the following areas. 1) Production of an inventory list of commodities for
ethanol and bio-diesel production and of personnel within the Ag Center who have an
interest in or are participating in bio-based energy research and/or extension programs. 2)
Identification of germplasms with high potential for ethanol production. 3) Development
of technologies to optimize ethanol yields from suitable feedstock. 4) Accelerate
information transfer to feedstock producers and business and financial communities.
Efforts underway in the bio-diesel area include establishment of an inventory of people
and resources, economic analysis and demonstration of relevant processes and
equipment.
The Age Center also has a strong interest in extension and outreach efforts such as
public awareness programs and symposia, and in providing demonstrations on the
effectiveness of biomass production.
Audubon Sugar Institute
The Audubon Sugar Institute, a unit within the Ag Center, has over the past two
years, with significant funding from the US Department of Energy, mounted a serious
research effort in the bio-based energy area.
There are two routes to ethanol from sugarcane biomass:
1. The pre-treatment of bagasse, prior to hydrolysis of the fibrous material and
fermentation of sugars produced to ethanol. Maximum value from bagasse can in
theory be obtained by separating bagasse into its three major components,
cellulose, lignin and hemicellulose; cellulose and hemicellulose are hydrolyzed,
but lignin is not hydrolyzed and may be the source of other value-added products
2. Thermochemical treatment, subjecting the biomass to high temperature pyrolysis
or gasification. Pyrolysis produces bio-oils and gasification produces a syngas
that can be converted in a catalytic reaction to liquid fuels.
Both routes are being investigated at Audubon. In addition, direct use of bagasse
fiber to produce geo-textiles for erosion control is being investigated.
Value-added products can be produced from sugarcane biomass but very few of
these processes are economically viable. The challenge is to find those processes, which
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when incorporated into a biorefinery, will lead to products of value that justify the capital
investment. Many different schemes have been devised in the Sugar Institute. The major
efforts have been directed towards pretreatment of bagasse and cane leaf matter, recovery
of phenols from the lignin fraction of the biomass, optimizing the enzymatic hydrolysis
for different pre-treatments, and the challenges of fermenting both glucose and pentose
sugars to ethanol and other products. Additional work has been done on producing more
cellobiose from hydrolysis for the production of added-value chemicals. Gasification
research is at an early stage but progress will be boosted with a second graduate student
next semester. A smaller program for the production of biodiesel in a modified process
using bio-ethanol and not methanol is also under way.
Biological and Agricultural Engineering
The department has about 160 student and three faculty members with research
and teaching responsibilities that relate to bio-energy. In addition, there is one extension
faculty member who has primary responsibilities toward energy conservation.
There are a number of projects in the bio-material area going on right now, for
instance, investigation of a cross-section of technologies that relate to animal waste
utilization in a bio-energy system (low-cost drying technologies for high moisture
materials and gasification systems with improved ash management to name a couple),
harvesting, transport, and storage of commodities in a bio-energy system and fuel cell
applications. Outside funding is coming from some smaller sources (mostly in-state and
commodity groups) right now.
Center for Energy Studies
The Center for Energy Studies is an interdisciplinary research unit focused on energy
policies and issues that are important to Louisiana. Its research faculty and staff include
economists, engineers, geographers, geologists, librarians and information specialists. In the fall
of each year the Center convenes an Energy Summit on conventional energy issues and in the
spring holds a parallel conference on alternative energy. The Center is working with the
Departments of Chemical Engineering and the Department of Biological & Agricultural
Engineering to develop an interdisciplinary effort to take advantage of the intellectual and
analytical resources of the University to develop and promote biofuels and bioenergy
industries in the state. The premise is that Louisiana has unique, but not well recognized,
advantages that can be exploited to improve the State’s economic performance,
reputation and prospects. In brief:
o Biofuels will not be substitutes for but supplements to conventional oil and
gas and will have to be integrated into the existing production, refining and
distribution system that is concentrated in Louisiana.
o A large proportion of the Nation’s corn crop comes down the Mississippi
River and some Louisiana crops are potential sources for biofuels.
o High energy prices made parts of the State’s petrochemical complex
uneconomic; biofuels may provide new feed stocks/products/jobs for these,
existing, old, unused plants.
The focus of the effort is the shorter-term, applied aspects of integrating larger
volumes of biofuels into the existing industrial infrastructure, rather than more basic,
longer-term research focus of most universities and federal programs. The Center’s
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contribution to the effort would be the analysis of economic and public policy issues
involved in more intensive and wider spread biofuels production and use.
Shaw Group Research Center
The Shaw Group has announced plan to construct a commercial scale bio-refinery
on the west bank of the Mississippi river, across from Baton Rouge. Initial discussions
have been held with LSU about the possibility of building a Biofuels Research Center
next to this plant. The Research Center would test and conduct research for the biofuels
complex as well as similar facilities on a non-proprietary basis. The Center would have the ability
to test biofuels technology and equipment on a commercial rather than merely bench scale basis.
Fuels and materials for the facility and test products could be furnished and returned to the
commercial biofuels complex on a cost or avoided cost basis. Such a university-based cooperative
venture with an established Fortune-500 company would furnish visibility and credibility to both
the biofuels industry and Louisiana’s efforts to assume a position of biofuel leadership.
Collaborative efforts with DuPont.
Efforts are underway to establish collaboration between researchers at LSU and
the biofuels group at DuPont. A meeting has been set up for March 26 2007 to discuss
various research possibilities.
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