Steve Sherman
The Quest for Alternative Energy
April / May 2010
Volume 8 Number 2
A vision of a future in which the nation takes full advantage of the benefits of its domestic energy resources drives much of Steve Sherman’s work at the Savannah River National Laboratory. “We need something to shake us out of the status quo to create value for the U.S.,” he says. “We need our energy to be produced here at home, and we need the high-tech jobs that it creates.”
That’s why he gets particularly enthusiastic about his work to make lignin from biomass into a practical profit line for biofuel producers. The quest for alternative energy has led the chemical engineer in several different directions that he finds rewarding, including improvements to fossil energy and new approaches to nuclear energy, but it is bioenergy that gets him really excited. As a native of the Detroit area, which has experienced high rates of unemployment for years, he is particularly interested in fields with long-term potential for employment. “Bioenergy sources are going to be great sources of energy supplies and jobs. By using these sources, we can make our own fuels right here at home, and not have to obtain them from overseas. That’s fuel that we need, but it’s also good jobs for the next generation.”
There’s a lot of interest nationwide in making ethanol and other fuels from cellulosic material—stems, leaves—“basically, anything that grows,” Sherman says. “To make ethanol by fermentation, you have to break down the cell into sugar,” he says. “Lignin, a natural polymer found in the cell walls of woody plants, “gets in the way of that breakdown, so we need to get it out of the way to expose the cell.”
Like some others in the field, he and his colleagues are looking at a pretreatment method that uses ammonia to separate the lignin from the cellulosic material. The difference, however, is that his process purifies the lignin and makes it available for other use. “It’s a valuable material, but with a lot of other processes, you wind up throwing it away. We’re trying to generate an additional revenue stream for a biorefinery, using something that otherwise would be a waste stream.”
To be useful, however, a pure stream of lignin product is needed, which has been the difficulty.
No one has commercialized lignin from ignocellulosic facilities yet. Paper mills sell lignin from their process, but that tends to be high in salt, and has to be purified before sale.
Lignin’s useful value is about equal to that of natural gas. It can be burned as a fuel, like paper mills do, used as fuel feed, or used to make polymers as additives for products like bio-degradable plastics. “It’s a way for a biorefinery that’s producing bio-ethanol or biodiesel to make more money by selling additional products,” he says, “which makes the whole enterprise more attractive.”
Part of the appeal of bioenergy for Sherman is the broad-based potential of the industry. He does a lot of work with the South Carolina Bioenergy Research Collaborative on initiatives that are specific to South Carolina and the southeast, but he sees broader application. “Biomass is distributed over a large area,” he says, “so it provides opportunities for larger numbers of people. Every region has their own bioenergy sources. The raw materials may be different, but the techniques are basically the same,” he says. “If we can provide the means to use these materials, we can make the nation energy self-sufficient.”
Another appeal is the collaborative nature of the work. Sherman, a chemical engineer, is working with other researchers who are biologists, microbiologists, chemists and other specialties. With the research collaborative, there are also partners from universities, engineering, agriculture and fuel distribution, all working toward the goal of building a regional demonstration facility for biofuels. “That’s important in a large project,” he says. “No one partner could ever have the whole picture. The sum is greater than the parts—we produce a better product.”
That was a lesson he learned as a doctoral student in Georgia Tech’s chemical engineering department, where working across departmental lines was encouraged. “That’s where I learned that collaborative research is very powerful. Working with people outside your own group is useful for avoiding ‘groupthink.’ I like to approach work by fostering collaboration, rather than encouraging competition,” he says.
The long-range nature of his work suits him, a long-distance athlete who runs marathons in his spare time, just fine. “From that, I have learned to work at things for a long time,” he says. “The race is long, but keep trying, and you’ll get there. It’s not the fast start that matters, but the finish.”
Just like in his athletic pursuits, which include triathalons, he pursues a variety of different alternative energy avenues. In addition to his work with lignin separation, he is pursuing other projects with lignin and biomass, along with some work in carbon capture. Making use of his background in nuclear energy (before coming to SRNL two years ago, Sherman had worked at Argonne and Idaho national laboratories in nuclear energy and cleanup, and spent a year with at DOE headquarters working in its nuclear program) he also supports the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor project, the U.S. role in an international collaboration to construct a full-scale experimental device to demonstrate the scientific and technological feasibility of fusion energy.
Angeline French is communications lead at the Savannah River National Laboratory.
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