Agora Feature - Dr. Charles Xu - Waste Not, Want Not
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Dr. Charles Xu | Lakehead's New Green Energy Lab will Support Research into Biomass TechnologiesBy Ade Michael Sekudo
Dr. Charles Xu, Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering, is researching energy production from bio-mass and wood products. He plans to build a Green Energy Laboratory by the end of 2007 with a grant of $135,512 from Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) and a matching grant of the same amount from the Ontario Ministry of Research & Innovation, and a recent award of $218,876 from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. Xu’s collaborating partners include Dr. Matthew Leitch of Lakehead’s Faculty of Forestry and the Forest Environment (who will share lab administrative duties with Xu), Dr. Jesse Zhu of The University of Western Ontario, and Dr. Pascale Champagne of Queen’s University. The Lakehead University Green Energy Laboratory (LUGEL) will accommodate facilities and the intensive research efforts of graduate students at the Master’s, PhD, and post-doctoral levels. It will be equipped with an array of state-of-the-art facilities including a high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), a gas chromatography/mass spectroscopy (GC/MS), a thermal gravity analysis system (TGA) and a bomb calorimeter. |
Charles Xu believes this new facility will promote awareness and further research on the viability of bio-energy and bio-refining — turning waste and by-products of industry such as pulp/paper mill sludge, sawdust/wood waste, and forest harvest residues, into bio-fuels, bio-resins, and other high-value chemical feedstock.
Lakehead is in the process of hiring two new Research Chairs in the field of biorefining and bioprocessing. The long-term goal is to develop a world-class Biorefining Research Institute at Lakehead University. In fact, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty visited the campus last May to announce a $6 million investment toward this project.
“Hydrogen is the fuel of the future” Xu says, and his primary concern lies in advanced methods of its production. “Right now, almost 80% of hydrogen is produced from natural gas but we need to look at cleaner ways to produce it, such as from bio-energy, wind, and solar energy.” Xu is excited at the prospect of turning waste streams of industry by-products such as sludge, sawdust, and harvest residue into significant amounts of energy for domestic and commercial consumption.
| Motivation for Xu's research stems from the dwindling natural reserves of petroleum, and bio-energy’s increasing popularity amongst environmentalists in the wake of global warming and astronomical energy prices. “We can only rely on petroleum for another 50 years, after which we have nothing to sustain our society; bio-energy provides an option.” In addition to long-term bio-energy research, Xu is hoping to use his newly created lab to uncover ways to convert bio-mass to hydrogen. He is also researching methods to convert bio-mass to bio-crude and bio-diesel. “The research direction is really promising and there is lots of work we can do, but we need to get more people involved.” Getting involved is exactly what Xu is doing. Another sub-stream of Xu’s project involves investigating technologies to create bio-chemical materials (such as bio-resins) from biomass in the same way that petrochemicals have spurred the creation of bio-polymers and bio-plastics for domestic and industrial use. “Bio-mass at present is a huge energy resource base; however, the challenge lies in harnessing it wisely and cost-effectively.” |
Undergraduate Chemical Engineering student |
Fortunately, contributors such as the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, FedNor, and Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation (NOHFC), have helped make this a less taxing process for Xu thus far. He also lists GreenField Ethanol (Canada’s leading fuel ethanol producer), and Toronto-based Dynea Canada as financial backers of his innovative project.
Xu readily asserts that his research is no “flash in the pan,” especially with all the international buzz surrounding bio-energy, transient or otherwise. “We are definitely thinking long-term research here at Lakehead.”
