Recognizing Variable Environments

Petroleum-based and natural gas-based chemicals are well-established products that have served industry and consumers for more than one hundred years. However, time is running out and natural gas and petroleum are now being depleted at a measurable rate. Thus, the need for alternative technologies to produce chemicals is necessary. Chemicals produced from sources other than natural gas and petroleum are making headway into the chemical balance. The dynamics are now coming into place for the establishment of a chemicals-from-biomass industry, recognizing that it is not only supply and demand but the available and variable technology. Biomass Processes and Chemicals is written to assist the reader in understanding the options that are available for the production of chemicals from biomass.