Converting corn into ethanol and valuable coproducts using the enzymatic dry grind process

The corn dry grind process is used for producing ethanol and a ruminant foodstuff coproduct. The dry grind process is an efficient method to produce ethanol but does not produce coproducts with high value. A modified process that will transform a dry grind facility into a biorefinery that produces coproducts for animal, human, and industrial uses has been developed. The new process, the enzymatic dry grind process, involves fractionation of corn at the beginning of the dry grind process and recovery of nonfermentable components (germ, pericarp, and endosperm fiber) prior to fermentation. Removal of these nonfermentables increased production capacity, improved fermentation efficiency, and allowed production of other valuable coproducts. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the AIChE Annual Meeting and Fall Showcase (Cincinnati, OH 10/30/2005-11/4/2005).