Rapid repurposing of pulp and paper mills, biorefineries, and breweries for lignocellulosic sugar production in global food catastrophes
- J. Throup, J. B. García Martínez, B. Bals, J. Cates, J. M. Pearce, D. C. Denkenberger
Summary
A global catastrophe on the scale of a major nuclear war could cause an abrupt sunlight reduction scenario that devastates agriculture. Throup et al. (2022) examines repurposing existing pulp and paper mills and other factories to turn fiber into sugar, a resilient food source that could be produced even in the absence of sunlight. They estimate that within nine months, the sugar could fulfill 28% of global caloric requirements, primarily through converting paper factories into sugar factories.
Abstract
Producing sugar from lignocellulosic biomass is a promising resilient food solution to counter the near-total global failure of food production due to the agricultural collapse that would likely follow an abrupt sunlight reduction catastrophe such as a nuclear winter, a supervolcanic eruption, or a large asteroid or comet impact. This study examines how quickly edible sugar production could be ramped up globally by repurposing pulp and paper mills, sugarcane biorefineries, corn biorefineries, and breweries for lignocellulosic sugar production. A sub-unit component comparison to the NREL 2017 Biochemical Sugar Model indicates that 85%, 61%, 62%, and 38% of ISBL unit components are present, respectively. Fast construction methods were studied to analyze how this and other industrial foods could be rapidly leveraged in a catastrophe. Results suggest that the world’s current sugar demand could quickly be fulfilled by repurposing pulp and paper mills for lignocellulosic sugar production, given 5 months of production ramp-up and 24/7 construction. This method could reduce construction time to an estimated 32% of the original at an increased labor cost of 1.47 times, resulting in sugar production beginning 5 months after the catastrophe at a retail cost of $0.82 USD/kg. This could not only contribute a significant share of the food requirement after the catastrophe (~28% within the first year), but also be key to preventing global starvation between the time at which global food storages run dry and other resilient food solutions can scale up significantly. This study aims to serve as the basis for more comprehensive scenario analyses. More research is needed to characterize material and labor constraints to fast response in more depth; repurposing and fast construction pilot studies and food safety studies are recommended.