关键词: 生物丁醇, ABE发酵, 原位分离, 生物炼制

Abstract: Biobutanol (n-butanol) is an important bulk chemical and a potential biofuel candidate, which can be obtained by acetone-butanol-ethanol (ABE) fermentation using sugars from renewable biomass resources. Because of the limitations of by-products formation, low concentration of solvents, and the azeotropic mixture obtained, the conventional biobutanol separation is costly and energy-intensive. To overcome the above limitations, recently, several novel separation techniques are adopted and coupled with ABE fermentation process. In this review, the current advances of the potential alternative separation techniques, including the vapor-liquid equilibrium, solvents polarity-based techniques and membrane-based separation, for biobutanol recovery is summarized. The multi-stage cascade separations for effective biobutanol separation are also summarized. Facing to the generation of commercial guide biobutanol production, the development trends of distillation is also included. With the improvement of separation technology and the development of biorefinery process, the production cost of biobutanol can be decreased, which would further improve the competitiveness of biobutanol process in a sight of commercialization.

Key words: Bio-butanol, ABE fermentation, In situ product recovery, Biorefinery