Mo re than a Check v alv e

of CO2 conversion technology, the carbon dioxide could be converted to ethanol using electrochemistry and gas fermentation, and the plant’s output would increase 30 percent—up to 58 MMgy of ethanol. However, this increase in output would come with an added 47 megawatts of power needed for the conversion process, which would need to come from renewable sources. To produce that much renewable energy, a total of 94-100 wind turbines would be needed.

If an ethanol producer is interested in integrating electrofuels technology into their plant, Grim recommends pursuing opportunities for systems integration, to identify the synergies of combining an ethanol biorefinery and a CO2 conversion process.

“With every year that passes, there’s likely going to be higher and higher demand for the carbon dioxide that’s coming out of the fermenter, because it’s just—ask any- body you have a discussion with—it’s an ideal feedstock for these e-fuel processes,” Grim says. “There’s going to be a lot of demand for it … in the future.”

Limitations and Challenges

One of the primary limiting factors to the development of electrofuels is the amount of cheap renewable electricity available on the market. Resch believes that more access to renewable energy will be needed before e-fuels can become widespread.

Although the Inflation Reduction Act and the SAF Grand Challenge have both been a driving force for advanced biofuel innovation in recent years, Resch sees electrofuels as a long-term goal regardless of the administration. “We try to take kind of a nonpartisan view of this and that it’s, in general, good for the country, good for this administration or the next administra-