Process design, modeling and life cycle analysis of energy consumption and GHG emission for jet fuel production from bioethanol in China

China's growing capacity of bioethanol production renders the conversion of ethanol-to-jet fuel (ETJ) promising. However, ETJ studies are currently scarce in China. This study employed process simulation to model two novel ETJ processes that combined corn cob gasification, syngas-to-ethanol, and ethanol-to-jet fuel. This paper also discussed the other three ETJs, in which ethanol were obtained via direct-fermentation of corn, cassava, and corn cob, respectively. Life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed to evaluate energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of ETJs in China. The results showed that the ETJ pathway, which included corn cob gasification plus fermentation, showed the least energy consumption and GHG emission, with 370.05 KJ/MJ jet fuel and 31.66 gCO2eq/MJ jet fuel, respectively. Sensitivity analysis was performed to identify parameters that had a significant impact on the results, and uncertainty analysis was implemented to check the reliability of the result. Further analysis revealed that cleaner electricity and heat production could effectively reduce the GHG emissions of the energy-intensive ETJs, with the highest reduction of 21.55%. Given that few life cycle assess-ments of ETJs in China have reported, this study can assist policy-makers to decide the path in which China's sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) should evolve.

Automated summary

China's increasing bioethanol production capacity makes the conversion of ethanol-to-jet fuel (ETJ) promising. This study used process simulation to model two novel ETJ processes combining corn cob gasification, syngas-to-ethanol, and ethanol-to-jet fuel. Life cycle assessment (LCA) was performed to evaluate energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions of ETJs in China. The results showed that the ETJ pathway with corn cob gasification plus fermentation had the lowest energy consumption and GHG emissions, with 370.05 KJ/MJ jet fuel and 31.66 gCO2eq/MJ jet fuel, respectively. Given the scarcity of life cycle assessments for ETJs in China, this study can assist policymakers in determining the path for China's sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) development.