Panama, a country located in Central America, has made significant efforts in terms of transitioning from fossil fuels towards renewable sources of energy. However, the country still faces the challenge of having a diversified and balanced energy mix. This study assesses the availability and shows the spatial distribution of biomass derived from agricultural residues throughout the country at the municipal level. To assess the amounts of residues available for bioenergy purposes, statistical data on crop production, residues-to-product ratios and correction factors were used. The correction factors refer to the fractions of residues that must be disregarded due to soil conservation and sustainability purposes, animal feeding, and handling losses. Geographical Information System (GIS) based maps were also developed to show the distribution of residues available throughout the country at the municipal level. It was identified that the main producers of residues are sugarcane, corn, rice, red kidney bean and vigna bean, generating a total of 400 k dry t of residues annually. Chiriquí, Veraguas, Coclé, Los Santos and Herrera, are the provinces of Panama with the greatest potential, accounting for 93% of the total available residues of the country. Based on the findings of this study, agricultural residues represent an important opportunity for Panama to increase the accessibility and diversification of renewable sources of energy in the country. The developed framework can be used for assessment of residues in different jurisdictions globally.

Pulse starch side streams have become abundantly available due to the increased demand for pulse proteins in the context of sustainable food production and sustainable diets. These pulse starches are of low value. Generating high-value bioproducts from them will create new market opportunities while addressing a circular economy and sustainable model for the total utilization of agri-food feedstocks in western Canada. Therefore, this project aimed to use side-stream pea starch to produce biobutanol. Upon enzymatic saccharification of the pea starch to release glucose, anaerobic bacterial strains, Clostridium acetobutylicum and C. saccharoperbutylacetonicum, were used to produce butanol. Initially, percentage ranges of 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50% (w/v) pea starch were tested to determine the optimal conditions for saccharification and maximum release of glucose. A 50% (w/v) saccharified pea starch released sufficient glucose (158.0 ± 0.7 g/L) to grow the bacterial strains in ten fermentative processes over 24 hours for biobutanol production. From 500 mL working volumes in anaerobic bottles, we tested a 5 L working volume of the diluted saccharified starch in a 10 L fermenter. Compared to the 500 mL, higher levels of butanol were produced in the 10 L fermenter. The Clostridial fermentative process also generates acetone, ethanol, and butanol through the well-established Acetone-Butanol-Ethanol (ABE) pathway. The gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS) results showed butanol concentrations ranged from 4.4 – 5.67 g/L. These preliminary results will be improved with further optimization and removal of toxicity effects of accumulated butanol.

This research presents the findings of an experimental study to assess H2 production from Canadian agricultural and forest biomass residues. The investigation utilized a 2 kg hr-1 lab-scale unit that includes an intermediate pyrolysis and thermo-reforming reactor, known as TCR. The aim is to evaluate the process performance by conducting feedstock and parametric experiments. While there has been extensive research on biomass gasification for H2 production, pyrolysis remains relatively unexplored. The study focused on understanding the impact of various pelletized feedstocks and operating conditions on the yield of H2-rich syngas. The tests were conducted across various temperatures, spanning from 400 to 550 °C for the reactor and from 500 to 700 °C for the reformer. The results indicate that the synthesis gas output fluctuates between approximately 45% and 70%. Among the diverse experimental conditions investigated, the H2 yield potential was found to be most responsive to changes in the temperature of the reactor-reformer, exhibiting variations from 24% to 35%. Furthermore, the method could generate economically valuable high-quality bio-oil (HHV: 30.92 to 37.28 MJ kg-1) and biochar (HHV: 33.73 to 30.50 MJ kg-1). TCR bio-oil, designed for higher quality (O/C: 0.07 to 0.16) compared to fast pyrolysis bio-oil, demands less pretreatment in subsequent processing within conventional refineries. This study's outcomes provide valuable insights for future research, particularly in the economic assessment and implementation of this technology on industrial and pilot plant scales. This underscores the significance of pyrolysis, filling a research gap compared to the well-studied area of biomass gasification.

In response to the global imperative for sustainable energy solutions, biofuels have emerged as renewable and potentially carbon-neutral alternatives to fossil fuels. Microbial lipids from oleaginous yeasts offer promising pathways for sustainable biofuel production. One such oleaginous yeast, Rhodosporidium toruloides, an oleaginous yeast, distinguished by its lipid accumulation capacity and ability to metabolize diverse substrates and tolerate toxic compounds. However, R. toruloides implementation is limited due to its lower C5 consumption ability of xylose, which is the second most abundant sugar in lignocellulosic biomass-based hydrolysates. This study focused on enhancing the xylose uptake efficiency of R. toruloides-1588 through adaptive laboratory evolution (ALE) to improve its bioconversion capabilities. R. toruloides was evolved in minimal media with 10 g/L xylose over 13 generations. The evolved strain showed 80% increase in the xylose consumption rate, with complete xylose assimilation and about 30% increase in biomass within 16 h compared to the native strain. This advancement not only demonstrated the potential of ALE in optimizing microbial strains for biofuel production but also set a precedent for the efficient use of lignocellulosic biomass, contributing to the development of more sustainable and cost-effective biofuel production processes. Further research into the genetic modifications in Rhodosporidium toruloides using genome sequencing and proteomics will help in understanding how these changes improve xylose utilization This will offer strategic targets for future bioengineering endeavours in the biofuel industry.

Industrial biotechnology can change how we manufacture many products (i.e., biofuels, biopolymers and other chemical building blocks) toward a renewable and more sustainable future. These processes usually rely on heterotrophic metabolism, in which an organic carbon molecule (glucose, glycerol, plant-based oils) is converted to other products through the pathways of specific microbes. In the current economic climate, these bio-based alternatives are expected to compete with low-priced petroleum, and sources of organic carbon account for 40-50% of the process costs, yet as much as 50% of the carbon is lost as CO2 under aerobic conditions. Further, this practice links the ecological footprint of supposedly ‘green’ products to that of the agriculture sector while also competing for productive acres that could otherwise be used to feed an increasing world population. It is therefore important to look to waste materials to produce high-volume, lower-value chemical commodities. Carbon dioxide is arguably the largest and most problematic source of anthropogenic waste, that can be captured by certain species of chemolithoautotrophic bacteria called hydrogen oxidizing bacteria (HOB). This talk will explore the potential, challenges, and limitations of HOBs to be used as a carbon capture and valorization to biofuels, polymers, and other products of interest. This is pursued with the motivation of developing CO2-based biorefinery that could reduce pressure on agricultural lands for production of high-volume chemical commodities This vision can contribute to several Sustainable Development Goals pertaining to climate, clean energy, hunger, as well as responsible production.

Butyric acid is a valuable platform chemical with a market value of upto 2500 USD/t and a broad range of applications in the pharmaceutical, food, polymer, and perfume industry. It’s production has been previously studied using various substrates and specific bacterial species. However, the fermentation of food waste offers a more sustainable and economical alternative. This study compares the acidogenic fermentation for volatile fatty acid (VFA) production at psychrophilic temperature against mesophilic temperature as it requires lesser energy input, especially in colder countries. The experiment, conducted at 37°C, 27°C, and 17°C, revealed distinct pH trend and VFA profiles. While the pH decreases rapidly to more acidic levels under mesophilic conditions, it is slower at 17°C, indicating delayed acidogenesis at lower temperatures. This maintenance of pH around 6 at 17°C, however, supported specific microbial activity, influencing VFA composition. Propionic acid concentration decreased at 17°C, which is in contrast with digestion studies performed at psychrophilic temperature. Notably, butyric acid became undetectible at 37°C, while sustaining longer at 17°C with 7-8 fold concentration of 500 mg/L, likely due to favourable pH conditions and lesser competition from competing microbial species. This prolonged presence of butyric acid at lower temperatures offers opportunities for enhanced production and prevention of its conversion to other compounds. The findings suggest potential strategies for optimizing VFA production at psychrophilic temperatures, including pretreatment, pH control, and extended retention times to promote butyric acid accumulation. Further exploration of microbial diversity could highlight metabolic pathways contributing to sustained butyric acid at low temperatures.

The evolution of sustainability has heightened the importance of circular business models, particularly in the food industry. Thus, stakeholders in the food system are increasingly focused on finding ways to valorize co/byproducts throughout the value chain, aiming to reduce global waste, enhance resource efficiency, and bolster sustainability. However, challenges persist in the form of a lack of a comprehensive framework guiding agro-industrial practices and difficulties in assessing the sustainability implications of circular pathways before implementation. Stakeholder engagement, particularly on the consumer side, is identified as a significant gap, introducing uncertainties about public interest and the commercial success of circular interventions. To address these challenges and foster a sustainable circular bioeconomy, a holistic accounting framework is proposed. This framework integrates stakeholder engagement, value chain analysis, sustainability assessment, and multicriteria decision analysis. It intends to provide an adaptable guideline to enable the co-creation of optimal, sustainable, and high-value upcycling solutions for a given system, especially while the concept gradually peaks and transitions to the commercial niche. The framework utilizes life cycle assessment and costing for environmental and economic analysis, introducing a novel employment index as a social metric. The sustainability metrics are modeled into a multivariable index, the circular bioeconomy index (CBI), to facilitate efficient communication of circular bioeconomy performance to non-technical stakeholders. Additionally, a multicriteria decision analysis approach, BWM-CoCoSo, is deployed as a robust approach for multiobjective trade-off analysis to facilitate policy and business actions toward identifying optimal circular bioeconomy decisions that align with predefined sustainability decision contexts.