The European Union is being challenged to reach its goals to replace a major part of its use of fossil feedstock for the production of transportation fuels and commodity polymers in the coming decades. The production of new versatile carbon-based building blocks from biomass resources can provide a unique alternative to avert a massive use of petroleum-based chemicals. Biomass from plant materials is the most important feedstock for food, feed and non-food applications. In the processing of plant materials e.g. maize, corn and sugarcane for starch and sugar and wood for paper, substantial amounts of potentially valuable by-products are produced. To keep the biorefinery operations sound from an environmental and an economical point of view, the pilot plant design, and by extension the future biorefinery development, needs to take into account the valorization of by-products.
The growing interest to develop sustainable biomass conversion processes at large scale has been exemplified by the SME Avantium, a CleanTech top 100 company. HUGS aims to provide an innovative, highly multidisciplinary and top educational program focusing on the valorisation of two key side products that are generated in large quantities in Avantium’s lignocellulosic biorefinery processes. To achieve this, an international network of excellence able to provide both scientific innovation and training in environmentally-sound alternatives is implemented. Three different innovative strategies have been identified from the processing of 2nd generation and waste feedstocks such as agricultural residues and waste paper streams to be employed in the framework of HUGS.
This multi-sectorial research work will contribute to breakthrough knowledge on the catalytic conversion and risk evaluation of side stream products and is necessary for a sustainable technological development of novel chemical building blocks, materials and fuels based on renewable resources. Furthermore, the project will provide a starting point to change the current perception of waste/side products as a PROBLEM into a more extended, advanced and almost unlimited RESOURCE of valuable products.
Beneficiaries
Avantium is a leading chemical technology company and a forerunner in renewable chemistry. Together with its partners around the world, Avantium develops efficient processes and sustainable products made from biobased materials. Avantium offers a breeding ground for revolutionary renewable chemistry solutions. From invention to commercially viable production processes.
Avantium’s Renewable Chemistries business unit focuses on developing and commercializing innovative products and processes in the renewable & sustainable chemistries space. Our track record in this area is exemplified by Avantium’s YXY Technology, our flagship process innovation program, which is now preparing for the construction of a first commercial plant. Following on from this, we have an “incubator lab” packed with innovative programs to deliver cost competitive renewable products and processes; addressing the challenges of sustainability for future generations. More information can be found at the company website: www.avantium.com.
The National Center for Scientific Research, or CNRS, is a public organization under the responsibility of the French Ministry of Education and Research.
Founded in 1939 by governmental decree, the CNRS aims to:
- Evaluate and carry out all research capable of advancing knowledge and bringing social, cultural, and economic benefits for society.
- Contribute to the promotion and application of research results.
- Develop scientific information.
- Support research training.
- Participate in the analysis of the national and international scientific climate and its potential for evolution in order to develop a national policy.
The UCO is heir to a centuries-old historical and cultural legacy as well as a passion for knowledge, tolerance, international renown and harmony among civilizations that have made the city that houses our institution a paradigm for humanity. This equilibrium and harmony is reflected in the three areas in which the UCO undertakes its activities: Food and Agriculture and Science and Technology; Humanities and the Legal and Social Sciences; and the Health Sciences; each with its own special characteristics. This balance is also manifested in quality teaching and research, ranking it among the top academic institutions in Spain.
Over 60 years of know-how in catalysis serve as the foundation for the Leibniz Institute for Catalysis Rostock (LIKAT). Today, LIKAT is one of the leading European Research Centres in the field of catalysis combining expertise in both, homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysis under one roof. Major goals of the scientific work are the elaboration of knowledge in basic research in all areas of catalysis as well as the transfer of results into technical applications.
Established by the French Government in 1990 as the National competence centre for Industrial Safety and Environmental Protection, INERIS has developed expertise in the areas of chronic and hazardous risks.
To carry out or commission studies and research programmes aimed at preventing the risks brought about by economic activities on health, the safety of persons and property and on the environment, and to provide any services intended to facilitate the adaptation of companies with this objective in mind.
Partner organizations
UTC is both a French national university and an engineering school, with autonomous training and pedagogy and an innovation-intensive, interdisciplinary technological research program. UTC produces graduates (engineers, Master’s degree, PhDs) capable of taking into account the interactions of technologies with Mankind and Society at large and of evolving in a world-scale competitive environment, with the aim of complying with sustainable development policies. The UTC lecturers, research scientists and engineers “lend meaning to innovation”, enabling the emergence of new axes underpinning this concept, introducing entrepreneurship principles in the heart of their concerns.
Reaching toward a world without pollution has become an imperative. The rise of chronic diseases, the increasing erosion of biodiversity and the economic costs associated with it must push all the actors of society to act and to act together in a comprehensive approach guarantees a higher efficiency .
It is with this objective that the Foundation deploys its actions to create a place for meetings and exchanges between scientists and all stakeholders involved in the protection of human health and ecosystems (companies, public authorities , associations …)