Opportunities with Wood Dissolved in Ionic Liquids

Biomass represents an abundant carbon-neutral renewable resource for the production of bioenergy and biomaterials. Shifting society’s dependence away from petroleum to renewable biomass resources is generally regarded as an important contributor to building up a sustainable society and effective management of greenhouse gas emissions. An ionic liquids-based processing platform for the efficient transformation of lignocellulosic materials into new materials and value-added chemicals has been developed. We have demonstrated that woody lignocellulosic materials are soluble in certain ionic liquids. The first preparation of homogenous wood solutions not only extends the utilization of lignocellulosic materials from heterogenous to homogenous processing conditions, but also creates a variety of new strategies for converting our abundant lignocellulosic biomass to novel value-added bioproducts. This chapter describes some applications under development, aimed at converting woody lignocellulose into new materials, chemicals and energy using ionic liquids as a processing platform.