Fermentation Technologies
Portable Biofuel Energy Technology Bioreactor Design

Portable Energy Technologies built on the base technology of biofuel process - when designed to qualify as consumer-operator well-engineered process technology - has applicability in the production of automobile fuels by consumer for use by consumers. The design of such portable energy technology, besides being built from the engineering designs for Ethanol-Fuel Distributed Power Generation Systems and therefore built in  compliance with the specification for such power generation systems, also has to comply with additional Specifications.

One such specification is the choice of substrate, which in this case is suggested to be lactose, that is quite different from the substrate specification for the large scale power system. Lactose which is ubiquitous is available mostly in the waste water, Whey, of diary products companies. As a result, the design of the power generation bioreactor  should also be different from the portable bioreactor, the object of which is the analysis.

The basic configuration of the bioreactor being adopted for the portable energy technology is the same as the packed-bed bioreactor. Several factors support this choice.

• First and foremost, the consumer is fully insulated from the daily operations of the technology, as this bioreactor allows for the design of the bioprocess as a closed system.
• Second, the batch reactor can be effectively controlled as to manage the growth and decline of biomass between batch-operating cycles, and consequentially eliminate the otherwise necessary complexity that would obtain from the inclusion of microbes immobilization reactor and the entire supporting process, if a different form of bioreactor were adopted.
• The adoption of lactose as substrate results in the design of the bioreactor to use any one of the Lactose utilizing microbes, including recombinant Saccharomyces Cerevisiae as the microbe for the ethanol fermentation, the involved reaction mechanism embodying the fermentation Biochemical Pathway of which is well-known. Moreover, the immobilization of the microbe can be accomplished by following the same approach as has been proposed in the analysis of batch biofilm bioreactor and the stirred heterogeneous bioreactor: The same method that was used for the experimental studies of the Immobilized Cells Reactor, ICR.

However, for the adopted microbes immobilization method, analysis of the reaction dynamics of the immobilized beads shows the very informative

This dramatic change is also known to be readily controlled through the tight metering of the reactants that participate in the anabolic reactions  that provide cellular functions maintenance, hence to ensure consistent operation of the bioreactor, the packed bed is modularized and delivered with the microbes immobilized as surface-colony. Further, the reactants for the anabolic reactions are controlled with an electronic control system, that feed just enough reactants relative to substrate content to support none cellular growth cell functions maintenance.

Finally, the bed is supported within the bioreactor such that allows the Mash to flow in and out around the microbes-carriers. The reaction fluid volume is also set for the beginning of each batch cycle to inundate the packed bed. Further, the reactor cap is also fitted with pressure control valve that vents carbon dioxide from the reactor during the period of reaction.

The Fermentation Mash Feeder for this reactor, however, is also different from the design for the commercial power generation version. In contrast, this Mash Feeder has only two inlet ports: One inlet is for feeding the substrate; The second inlet is for feeding the reactants for the anabolic reactions. In simplification of the task of providing the special reactants, the reactor is recommended to be operated with tomato paste, which is to be used instead of the myriad set of reactants for the anabolic reactions. The rationale for this choice is that consumers can much easier support this raw material than the pure reactants, and that contents of the often required reactants are available in tomato paste at such low levels as to be just sufficient to provide support for only cell-functions maintenance.

During operation, the bioreactor is charged with feed from the feed tank in which the consumer will have pumped in whey. After the feed volume reaches the design preset amount, the feed charging stops and the fermentation begins undisturbed. At the end of the duration of the reaction, the reaction mixture is pumped out, and the reactor is yet again charged with a fresh feed. The operating duration of the batch cycle is not necessarily the same as the true batch reaction time. Rather, most significantly, the duration of the reaction is a pre-determined time-span, at the end which the bioreactor, which

The packed bed is supplied at maintenance visits and the consumer never has to directly operate the process though such operation if necessary can be guided remotely from the technical support facility.

The consumer has to arrange with dairy products companies to have the supply of the whey on a regular bases.

The use of sugar cane juice as feed requires a change of the  Lactose utilizing microbe immobilized packed bed to a Glucose utilizing microbe immobilized packed bed, and such switch is anticipated to be readily supported by technical support facility.

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