In 1979 the US Department of Energy, Office of Alcohol Fuels, asked the Solar Energy Research Institute to develop a process for manufacturing methanol from biomass. This can be achieved by gasification of the biomass to a ''synthesis gas'' (syn-gas) (composed of primarily hydrogen and carbon monoxide) followed by catalytic conversion of the gas to methanol. The catalytic conversion of syn-gas is a well developed commercial process. There are a number of gasifiers for wood, but most of them make either a producer gas, high on nitrogen or a pyrolysis gas high in hydrocarbons. None were developed to make syn-gas. Thus the principal technical problem was to develop a gasifier to make synthesis gas from biomass. Work was performed at SERI from 1980--1985 which resulted in the development of a prototype 1 ton/day oxygen-biomass gasifier. In 1985 a program was undertaken for Congress by the US Department of Energy (DOE) to build a commercial scale (50--200 tons/day) medium energy gasifier, based on DOE or other research. A new company, Syn-Gas Inc. (SGI), research. A contract was awarded to SGI to modify the air gasifier for oxygen operation for this project. This modification allowed extended tests of the gasifier with oxygenmore » to determine the possibility of scaling up the SERI-SGI gasifier to 50--200 tons/day.« less