Methods for liquefaction of carbonaceous materials, including methods that use electromagnetic radiation. Systems for liquefaction of carbonaceous materials. The systems may include a circulation conduit for mixing reactants, and/or a heating apparatus that relies on electromagnetic radiation.

A Heated Airlock Feeder is disclosed. The Heated Airlock Feeder allows for the continuous feeding of solid, shredded plastic into a reactor tube surrounded by clamshell burner boxes. Inside of the reactor tube, two augers, one with right hand flights and one with left hand flights are welded to smooth augers to create two continuous augers that push solid plastic material, liquid plastic material and molten plastic material through two small holes. As the plastic is in its molten state while being forced through the two small holes, an airlock is formed preventing air form entering the system. As the solid, shredded plastic is fed into the system, an airlock is formed allowing for the continuous feeding of the system. The clamshell burner boxes allow for convection and radiant heat allowing for even, continuous heat.

Provided is a method for upgrading polymer waste-based material. The method includes providing a polymer waste-based feedstock, providing a crude oil-derived feedstock, mixing the polymer waste-based feedstock, the crude oil-derived feedstock, and optionally a further feed material, to provide a feed mixture, hydrotreating the feed mixture in a FCC feed hydrotreater to provide a hydrocarbonaceous material, and recovering at least a distillate product and a distillation bottoms product from the hydrocarbonaceous material (step E).

The present disclosure relates to a method for upgrading liquefied waste plastics, the method including a step (A) of providing liquefied waste plastics (LWP) material, a step (B) including pre-treating the liquefied waste plastics material by contacting the liquefied waste plastics material with an aqueous medium having a pH of at least 7 at a temperature of 200° C. or more, followed by liquid-liquid separation, to produce a pre-treated liquefied waste plastics material, a step (C) including hydrotreating the pre-treated liquefied waste plastics material, optionally in combination with a co-feed, to obtain a hydrotreated material, and a step (D) of post-treating the hydrotreated material to obtain a steam cracker feed.

Aqueous wastewater from hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) systems is typically high in chemical oxygen demand (COD), which renders classic aerobic wastewater treatment to be prohibitively expensive. HTL wastewater can be processed using thermochemical wet oxidation in a manner that is not only cost efficient but also contributes more heat than is required for the energetically demanding HTL process. Provided are methods and devices for integrated hydrothermal liquefaction of biomass and treatment of resulting wastewater.

Where thermochemical liquefaction of lignocellulosic biomass is conducted using recirculated product oil as solvent, yields can be substantially increased by addition of a short chain alcohol reactant such as ethanol or methanol. A synergistic effect is thereby obtained where liquefaction is improved over using either recycled product oil or alcohol alone. The combination of re-circulated product oil and alcohol reactant permits high conversion at operating pressures considerably lower than typically applied in alcohol solvolysis, typically within the range 30-60 bar. The liquefaction reaction occurs at subcritical pressure where the alcohol acts as a gaseous reactant and not as a solvent.

A system for converting a biomass into a biofuel including a biomass processing station arranged to receive the biomass from a biomass harvester, output the biomass to a hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) converter, and receive a processed biomass from the HTL converter. The system includes a conduit arranged to transport the biomass from the biomass processing station to the HTL converter and transport the processed biomass from the HTL converter to the biomass processing station. The HTL converter includes a heat exchanger arranged to transfer thermal energy from a geothermal heat source to the biomass to convert the biomass into the processed biomass. The system also includes a controller arranged to monitor conditions of the biomass at locations along the conduit and adjust operations of components along the conduit to, thereby, adjust the conditions of the biomass at one or more locations along the conduit.

Methods for utilizing a supercritical water unit to convert waste plastics to product through hydrothermal treatment in a supercritical unit are provided. Waste plastic is treated in a pretreatment unit, melting the plastic into a liquid and prepares the plastic for the supercritical water unit. The pretreatment unit can dehalogenate the waste plastic. The molten plastic is introduced into a supercritical water unit with water, which generates a product. A flushing stream of product and steam or water from the supercritical water unit is recycled from the supercritical water unit into the pretreatment unit, preheating and pretreating the waste plastic, and acting as a catalyst in the dechlorination reaction. A purge stream removes the products of the dehalogentation reaction occurring in the melting section.

A system for converting a biomass into a biofuel including a biomass processing station arranged to receive the biomass from a biomass harvester, output the biomass to a hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) converter, and receive a processed biomass from the HTL converter. The system includes a conduit arranged to transport the biomass from the biomass processing station to the HTL converter and transport the processed biomass from the HTL converter to the biomass processing station. The HTL converter includes a heat exchanger arranged to transfer thermal energy from a geothermal heat source to the biomass to convert the biomass into the processed biomass. The system also includes a controller arranged to monitor conditions of the biomass at locations along the conduit and adjust operations of components along the conduit to, thereby, adjust the conditions of the biomass at one or more locations along the conduit.

The disclosure relates to a process for converting lignocellulosic feedstock (10) to renewable product (80), wherein the process comprises the following steps; treating (100) lignocellulosic feedstock (10) with aqueous solution (20) to obtain a mixture (30); heating (110) the mixture (30) of step (a) to a temperature between 290 and 340° C., under a pressure from 90 to 120 bar, to obtain a first product mix (40); separating aqueous phase (53) and oil phase (50), and optionally gas (51) and solids (52), of the first product mix (40) of step (b); and heating (130) the oil phase (50) of step (c) and solvent (60). The heating (130) is optionally followed by fractionation (200) to obtain a light fraction (90) and a heavy fraction (91) and optionally a bottom residue fraction (92) and/or a gaseous fraction.