In China, the demand of ethylene is increased by 20% year by year. The output of 2010 is supposed to be around 30 million tons, which is less than half of the demand, and the rests of them need to be imported. Nowadays, the production of ethylene is mainly via the route of cracking of oil. As the shortage of global energy sources, to produce ethylene from bio-ethanol is inevitable. The development of bio-ethylene can catalyze the use of ethanol as fuel, play an important role in oil-substituted and the safety of national energy sources.
The research is focused on the ethanol production by genetically modified Saccharomyces cerevisiae and catalysts of catalytic ethylene production. To improve the temperature, substrate and product tolerance of ethanol producer and investigate the key factors for the glucose conversion ratio, the metabolic engineering methods are used to improve the multiple-stress tolerance of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the ethanol production level. Some novel technologies will also be demonstrated to reduce the cost of separation during the ethanol production process. Additionally, effective catalysts of ethanol dehydration and novel reaction equipment will also be developed. The coupling of ethanol production and ethanol dehydration is studied, and pilot process and equipment of ethylene production from ethanol dehydration is established to lay a foundation for its industrial application. The goal of this project is to exploit effective catalysts of ethanol dehydration and novel catalyst equipment, research the coupling of ethanol production and ethanol dehydration, establish the pilot process and equipment of ethylene production from bio-ethanol dehydration and supply technical guarantee of its industrial application. The research has innovations and feasibilities on above mentioned aspects, after the accomplishment of the project, it is impossible to occupy the markets both national and international of bio-ethylene production.
