Pyrolysis as the New Fischer-Tropsch

At the National Biodiesel Conference there was a few mentions of "bio-crude" and fast-pyrolysis. Last year the big talk was Fischer-Tropsch. Its funny how technology talk happens in trends. Like waves striking upon a beach you don't hear about a technology and then when people start fund raising for it - BOOM - its never just one company.

Also a funny story. I'm standing in the LPP Combustion booth and this guy stops by and asks if their technology can run bio-crudes. I ask what he's doing and he announces that they will produce a bio-crude from pyrolysis which they are going to specify to meet an "ASTM Boiler fuel" spec.

I then ask him what a boiler fuel spec looks like. The guy got really flustered and started yelling at me (seriously screaming). It was quite bizarre. In particular the fact that he was building a business plant for an experimental technology that would make money running in the least finnicky and dirtiest of systems in the US (we have boilers in the Pacific Northwest permitted for used tires and toxic waste).

Anyways the real purpose of this post. I also came across a nifty article about a "bio-crude" pyrolisis company that is recently splashing in the news. Thought I would post it along with my interesting pyrolisis story.