Lignin from bark as a resource for aromatics production by hydrothermal liquefaction

Biorefineries, which are using mostly unused side streams of other existing processes like bark or lignin, have a huge potential to open new resources, for example, chemicals. But with new resources new challenges will be met along the way. These challenges must be addressed and discussed to build a solid and far-sighted process. This work focuses on the formation of monocyclic compounds like catechol as a valuable product during the hydrothermal liquefaction of beech wood bark as well as Kraft lignin from pine wood like Indulin AT. The focus is to get a better knowledge of the behavior of bark during hydrothermal liquefaction for depolymerization aiming at the production of aromatic building blocks for chemicals. Therefore, the influence, for example, of temperature and reaction time, the chemical reaction pathways, and the therefore necessary analytics need to be understood. Several limitations and challenges of common analytical methods are discussed and compared for bark and Kraft lignin, which is relatively well investigated and can act as a reference material to build a common ground and make it possible to build standards for all bioeconomic processes. Hydrothermal conditions increase the yield and selectivity toward bifunctional molecules like catechol. With rising temperatures and longer retention times, the catechol mass yields get lower. At temperatures above 350 degrees C, nearly no catechol could be found any more. Different types of wood deliver different lignin compositions in terms of the monomeric units. However, it can be observed that different lignins show the same trends in regard to the catechol yield concerning temperatures and reaction time dependence, but overall a different product spectrum.