The 40 Hottest Technologies of 2018 – as voting gets underway, the nominees in depth
Crumbles Precision Feedstock Technology
What does it do, how does it work, who is it aimed at?
Forest Concepts combined structural plant biology with engineering and developed a novel rotary shear machine that can process woody biomass and ag residues at high moisture content into uniform, flowable reactor-ready feedstock particles down to 1mm. If drying is required for the conversion process, the small Crumbles(r) particles require significantly less energy and less residence time to dry than drying and hammermilling. Processing at high moisture content results in significantly less energy required as well as minimal fines produced. Particle characteristics such as size and aspect ration can be optimized for a specific conversion process using the Crumbler(r) technology. Every biorefinery needs quality feedstocks and the Crumbler technology is industry agnostic.
Competitively, what gives this technology an edge?
Current feedstock processing in a biorefinery is typically performed by drying the biomass to less than 10% and then hammermilling the material. Crumbling the biomass does not require drying first, which provides the option of maintaining moisture content for the conversion process, and if drying is required, it is much more energy efficient to dry small particles, which will result in a reduction in OPEX that could be very significant over a year of processing. It has been shown that optimizing particle size and moisture content has resulted in higher yields from processing.
What stage of development is this technology at right now?
The first commercial scale Crumbler machine was installed earlier this year at Proton Power’s renewable diesel plant in Rockwood, TN where it has been operating successfully for five months.
Category: Top Stories
