Towards a circular biorefinery system for efficient biobased furfural and levulinic acid production based on techno-economic analysis.

Furfural (FUR) and levulinic acid (LA) are promising biobased platform chemicals that can be converted into value-added chemicals. An integrated biorefinery process is applied to FUR and LA production from corncob for efficient feedstock and energy utilization. Here, a techno-economic analysis of the integrated process of FUR and LA production was performed.

Coupling process for preparing biomass-based furfural and levulinic acid from corncob: Extraction, green chemistry and techno-economic assessment.

The purpose of this study is to design and investigate two coupling processes for acid-catalyzed hydrolysis of corncob, achieving the simultaneous preparation of biomass-based furfural and levulinic acid (LA). Meanwhile, high concentration and yield of LA were obtained through a situ feeding strategy of pretreated furfural residue with high solids loading (20%, w/v). In Scenario A, 2-methyltetrahydrofuran was selected as the solvent for the LA extraction process compared with the neutralization process in Scenario B.