| Project Detail |
Arrested anaerobic digestion (AAD) is a process that inhibits methane formation while bacteria break down organic matter without oxygen. AAD can potentially produce carbon-negative chemicals and biofuels from organic waste. Three technical hurdles, however, have limited AAD’s widespread commercial success: (1) limited system capacity for processing diverse solid and liquid feedstocks of varying quality and composition, (2) resistance to variations in feedstock input over time, and (3) greater energy consumption needed for separation than the lower heating value of the produced volatile fatty acids (VFAs), precluding their use for biofuels production.
Project Innovation + Advantages:
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) aims to develop the first carbon negative biorefinery that funnels multiple organic waste feedstocks into a chemically consistent stream of volatile fatty acids (VFAs) that are upgraded to carbon negative products. NREL’s Recirculating System for Optimal Use of Refuse with Control and Efficiency (ReSOURCE) process operates via arrested anaerobic digestion, and it accumulates and selectively isolates VFAs. The VFA products serve as robust platform chemicals to subsequently produce sustainable aviation fuel, lubricants, and cleaning surfactant substitutes. |
