JP-7857070-B2 - ethanol

Inventors

• 濱地 心
• 柳橋 宣利
• 西山 悠

Assignees

• 積水化学工業株式会社

Dates

Publication Date

20260512

Application Date

20190625

Claims (3)

1. A process to convert a waste-derived carbon source into synthesis gas containing carbon monoxide and hydrogen, A step of purifying the synthesis gas containing carbon monoxide and hydrogen using a pressure swing adsorption type separation apparatus, The purified synthesis gas is supplied to a fermenter containing Clostridium microorganisms as microorganisms, and a microbial fermentation step is taken to obtain a culture medium containing ethanol by microbial fermentation. The culture solution is separated into a solid component containing microorganisms and a liquid component containing ethanol using a solid-liquid separation filter device to obtain an ethanol-containing solution ; A purification step in which the ethanol-containing solution is purified by distillation , Includes, The purified ethanol composition is In a gas chromatograph measured under the following conditions using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS), The retention time peaked between 6 minutes 36 seconds and 6 minutes 45 seconds . A method for producing a waste-derived ethanol composition in which the retention time peak between 6 minutes 36 seconds and 6 minutes 45 seconds is derived from n-decane, and the concentration of n-decane is between 0.01 mg/L and 1.0 mg/L . <Analysis conditions for GC/MS method> Column: DB-5MS (length 30m, inner diameter 0.25mm, film thickness 0.25μm) Oven temperature: 40°C → 10°C/minute → 300°C Carrier gas: He (1.28 mL/min) Inlet temperature: 300℃ Detector temperature: 300°C Detector: Flame ionization detector; Injection volume: 1 μL (split ratio 1:20)
2. A method for producing a waste-derived ethanol composition according to claim 1, wherein the concentration of n-decane is 0.02 mg/L or more and 0.5 mg/L or less.
3. A method for producing a waste-derived ethanol composition according to claim 1, wherein the concentration of n-decane is 0.05 mg/L or more and 0.5 mg/L or less.

Description

This invention relates to ethanol, and more particularly to ethanol in which the content of specific trace components has been adjusted. Furthermore, this invention relates to a novel resource-recycling type of ethanol that does not rely on conventional petroleum resources or biomass resources, but uses a gas containing carbon monoxide and hydrogen as a substrate. Petrochemical products are used in many aspects of our lives. However, precisely because they are such commonplace products, their mass production and consumption are causing various environmental problems, which are a major global issue. For example, polyethylene and polyvinyl chloride, representative petrochemical products, are consumed in large quantities and are often disposable, with their waste being a significant contributor to environmental pollution. Furthermore, the mass production of petrochemical products raises concerns about the depletion of fossil fuel resources and the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which are global environmental problems that are also being discussed. Due to the growing global awareness of such environmental issues, methods for producing various organic substances using raw materials other than naphtha, a primary ingredient in petrochemical products, have been explored in recent years. For example, methods for producing bioethanol from edible raw materials such as corn through sugar fermentation are attracting attention. However, such sugar fermentation methods using edible raw materials have been criticized for potentially leading to increased food prices, as they require the use of limited farmland for non-food production. To address this problem, the use of non-edible raw materials that were previously discarded is being considered. Specifically, methods such as producing alcohols through fermentation using waste materials and cellulose derived from recycled paper, or gasifying biomass raw materials and producing alcohols from the resulting synthesis gas using a catalyst, have been proposed. However, these methods have not yet been put into practical use. Furthermore, even if various petrochemical products could be manufactured from these de-petrification raw materials, they would ultimately become non-biodegradable waste plastics, making them ineffective as a fundamental solution to environmental problems. Incidentally, the amount of combustible waste currently discarded in Japan amounts to approximately 60 million tons per year. Its energy content is equivalent to approximately 200 trillion kilocalories, far exceeding the energy content of naphtha used as a raw material for plastics in Japan, and thus this waste can be considered a valuable resource. If these waste resources can be converted into petrochemical products, it will be possible to realize the ultimate resource-recycling society that does not rely on petroleum resources. From the above perspective, Patent Documents 1 and 2 disclose a technology for producing synthesis gas (a gas mainly composed of CO and H2 ) from waste, and then producing ethanol from that synthesis gas by fermentation. However, as pointed out in Patent Document 3, synthesis gas produced from waste contains a wide variety of unidentified impurities, some of which are toxic to microorganisms. Therefore, productivity has been a major challenge in producing alcohol from synthesis gas through microbial fermentation. Furthermore, the alcohol obtained from microbial fermentation of synthesis gas also contains various components resulting from the impurities in the synthesis gas, and these components cannot be completely removed even by purification processes such as distillation. Therefore, developing derivative products from alcohol obtained from microbial fermentation of synthesis gas has been a major technical challenge. Japanese Patent Publication No. 2016-059296International Publication No. 2015-037710Japanese Patent Publication No. 2018-058042 These are the gas chromatograms of the ethanol used in Example 1, Comparative Example 1, and Comparative Example 2. The following describes an example of a preferred embodiment for carrying out the present invention. However, the following embodiments are illustrative for explaining the present invention, and the present invention is not limited in any way to the embodiments described below. <Definition> In this invention , "ethanol" does not mean pure ethanol as a compound (ethanol represented by the chemical formula CH3CH2OH ), but rather a composition containing impurities (contaminating components) that are inevitably present in ethanol produced through synthesis or purification. <Ethanol> The ethanol according to the present invention was measured by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS) under the following conditions, and in the gas chromatograph, Ethanol with a retention time peaking between 6 minutes 36 seconds and 6 minutes 45 seconds. <Analysis conditions for GC/MS method> Column: DB-5MS (length 30m, inner dia