(6jq) Life-Cycle and Techno-Economic Assessment of Microalgal Biorefinery for Biological CO2 Sequestration

In recent years, global warming driven climate change is threatening the existence and questioning the survivability of entire humanity. The major cause is due to the increase in concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Use of fossil fuels and other anthropogenic causes further elevate the issue that demands immediate measures to be taken. In such scenarios, looking for bio-based options is a good strategy as it is renewable, sustainable and does not pose a threat to economic security. My research interest lies in finding solutions to transform and unleash the wealth that is present in the waste and aim for a sustainable future using techniques and principles of biochemical engineering. I have experience in microalgal cultivation using flue gas in indoor and outdoor systems, CO₂ sequestration, waste water treatment, development of biorefinery, life-cycle analysis, techno-economic assessment, modelling and simulation of chemical process using PC-SAFT and gSAFT in Aspen Plus and gPROMS.

PhD Research:

My doctoral dissertation involves microalgal cultivation in open raceway reactors and closed photobioreactors, CO₂ sequestration from flue gas using microalgae, process integration with wastewater treatment, biomass generation for biorefinery application such as fish feed, biofuel etc. and performing process techno-economic and life cycle analysis.

Research experience and Awards:

• Fulbright-Kalam Climate Fellow- I worked with Prof. Warren Seider from the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. We have developed a CO2 intensified process for the extraction of algal oil and its conversion to biodiesel using microbubbles. The techno-economics and life cycle analysis of the process was investigated using aspen Plus Process Analyzer.
• Newton-Bhabha Fellow- I worked in the laboratory of Prof. Will Zimmerman at the University of Sheffield, UK in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering. The work involved use of CO₂ microbubbles generated by fluidic oscillator to strip ammonia off from the landfill leachate and using the processed leachate as inexpensive growth medium for microalgal cultivation and lipid accumulation.
• Benjamin L Van duuren Award

Teaching Interests: During my doctoral study at IIT Kharagpur, I have supervised 3 undergraduate and 2 post-graduate students, each for their one year long dissertation work. I have also evaluated detailed lab reports of undergraduate students to assess and provide suggestions to improve their writing abilities.

Future Directions: As a faculty candidate I would like to apply the knowledge that I acquired in Process Modelling and Simulation of biofuel production processes through my experience in cultivation of algae, harvesting, extraction of bio fuels from algae, downstream processing to various fundamental and industrial problems in Chemical Engineering.

Publications:

Yadav G and Sen R (2017). A microalgal green refinery concept for biosequestration of flue gas carbon dioxide vis-à-vis wastewater remediation and bioenergy production: Recent technological advances. Journal of CO2 Utilization, 17: 188-206.

Subramanian G, Yadav G and Sen R (2016). Rational use of mixotrophic microalgae for reducing carbon footprint of microalgal cultivation strategies in photobioreactors: A technological perspective. RSC Advances, 6:72897-72904.

Yadav G, Karemore A, Dash SK and Sen R. (2015). Performance evaluation of a green process for microalgal CO2 sequestration in closed photobioreactor using flue gas generated in-situ. Bioresource Technology. 191: 399-406.

Yadav G, Singh A, Bhattacharya P, Yuvraj J and Banerjee R (2013). Comparative analysis of solid-state bioprocessing and enzymatic treatment of finger millet for mobilization of bound phenolics. Bioprocess and Biosystems Engineering. 36 (11): 1563-1569.

Singh A, Kuila A, Yadav G and Banerjee R (2011). Studies on the process optimization of antioxidant rich polyphenol from okara. Food Technology and Biotechnology, 49 (3) 322–328.

Yadav G, Seider WD, Soh L and Zimmerman J (2018). Process Intensification of Algae Oil Extraction to Biodiesel. (In) 13^th International symposium on Process Systems Engineering (PSE 2018). (Ed) Mario R. Eden, Marianthi G. Ierapetritou, Gavin P. Towler. Pp. 1699-1704. Elsevier, USA.

Yadav G and Sen R (2018). Sustainability of Microalgal Biorefinery: Scope, Challenges, and Opportunities. (In) Sustainable Energy Technology and Policies: A Transformational Journey. (Ed) Sudipta De, Santanu Bandyopadhyay, Mohsen Assadi, Deb A Mukherjee. Pp 335-351. Springer, Singapore.

Yadav G, Kumar, R and Sen R (2015). Fermentation techniques in bioenergy production. (In) Marine bioenergy: Trends and developments. (Ed) Se-Kwon Kim and Choul-Gyun Lee. Pp 111-134. CRC Press, USA.

Karemore A, R Dineshkumar, Yadav G, Subramanium G and Sen R (2015). Photobioreactors for improved algal biomass production: Analysis and Design considerations. (In) Algal Biorefinery: an integrated approach (Ed) Debabrata Das. Capital Publishing Company. Springer International Publishing.