Biorefineries using crops for production of ethanol, biogas and chemicals - Biomass as Energy Source: Resources, Systems and Applications - page 150

formed a “Green Island mode”. The company takes the tourism industry as a leading power to
build a recycling agricultural production system, based on the concept of a recycling economy,
which from its formation is a recycling agricultural production base taking an ecological agricul-
ture tourism industry as carrier. The Inner Mongolia Ulan Cement Group Co., Ltd. has explored
an Ulan power - cement symbiotic recycling economy mode (referred to as “Ulan-mode”).
Huaibei Mining Group takes coal, rock salt and limestone resources as the basis and
the “Coal-Salt Integration Project” as a symbol, to build several industry chains such as
“coal → coke-forming” “coal → waste rock → building materials,” “coal → electricity →
calcium carbide → PVC” and to form a recycling economic structure of “small cycles in mine
wells, big ones in mine areas”.
Lubei Enterprise Group has formed a close symbiotic Lubei chemical-based eco-industrial
ecosystem, through the organic communication and integration of three industrial chains:
co-production by ammonium phosphate; sulfate cement by sulfuric acid; seawater, “a multi-
purpose water” and saline cogeneration.
Compared with western countries, whether in terms of recycling economy theory studies or
from practice, there is a big gap. The breakthrough on issues such as theory, means of realization
and operationwill determine the development speed of China's recycling economy, and is essential
insofar as within the academic system there have been no systematic studies on the bio-fuel
industry business cycle economic mode. The theorists often focus on the general analysis of
recycling economy research and lack the quantitative research and systems analysis of the material
cycle and the proliferation of the value, which is the most essential content to reveal the recycling
economy. Enterprises are important carriers in industry and social and economic development
so that to build recycling enterprises has become a core issue in establishing a resource-saving
society. Therefore, it seems to be extremely important to explore and summarize the recycling
economy mode of bio-fuel enterprises based on the concept of a recycling economy.

9.3 QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE CASE STUDY

9.3.1 The scope of the case study
As to Tianguan Group's fuel ethanol and its by-product industry, for the convenience of explana-
tion, this case mainly takes the Tianguan Fuel Ethanol Company, the core company of Tianguan
Group as an example to illustrate. Tianguan fuel ethanol company's existing production sys-
tems include: wheat flourmill → wheat gluten flour mill → ethanol plants → feed mill → CO 2

plant water treatment plant, and besides there is a thermal power plant, which is to provide

energy for the whole plant, and the plants, which are carrying out construction projects, including
a carbon dioxide biodegradable plastic factory and large-scale biogas plants. The factory's general
production process is shown in Figure 9.1.

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9.3.2 Description of the basic characteristics of the case study
The fuel ethanol industry is a renewable biomass energy industry, in general, including fuel ethanol
production, conversion, and comprehensive utilization etc. Wheat fuel ethanol by-products not
only work as feed, but also as raw materials of biogas, organic fertilizer and other products. The
industry characteristics of the fuel ethanol industry determine that it is a prerequisite for the
development of the recycling economy. Out of the need for economic or environmental benefits,
fuel ethanol enterprises and its related enterprises are symbiotic. Related enterprises are biogas,
wheat bran and wheat gluten enterprises, DDG feed companies, organic fertilizer plants and other
enterprises concentrated in a particular area. Together they are forming a symbiotic system, which
has certain structure, and function in an industrial biotechnology community. The fuel ethanol
enterprises are “major species” in the system. The bran and gluten flour mill is the upstream
business, the CO 2 production plant is a symbiotic business, biogas and organic fertilizer plants
and other enterprises are downstream enterprises of the fuel ethanol business, which can be called
“secondary species” (Du and Hu, 2010).