Renewable Resources for Biorefineries

Book excerpt: With the increasing awareness and concern about the dependency on fossil resources and the depletion of crude oil reserves, experts from industrial biotechnology, renewable resources, green chemistry, and biorefineries are stimulating the transition from the fossil-based to the bio-based economy. This text confronts scientific and economic challenges and strategies for making this crucial transition. Renewable Resources for Biorefineries is the work of a strongly interdisciplinary authorship, offering perspectives from biology, chemistry, biochemical engineering, materials science, and industry. This unique approach provides an opportunity for a much broader coverage of biomass and valorisation than has been attempted in previous titles. This book also represents the fundamentally important technical and policy aspects of a bio-based economy, to ground this important science in a realistic and viable economic framework. Chapters in this book cover a diverse range of topics, including: advanced generation bioenergy sectors; biobased polymers and materials; chemical platform molecules; industrial crops and biorefineries; financing and policy for change; and valorisation of biomass waste streams. This is an ideal book for upper level undergraduate and postgraduate students taking modules on Renewable resources, green chemistry, sustainable development, environmental science, agricultural science and environmental technology. It will also benefit industry professionals and product developers who are looking to improve economic and environmental ways to utilise renewable resources in current and future biorefineries.