Patent ID: 8263792

Claim:
A process to hydrolyze naturally occurring carbohydrates in or from biomass sources into versatile platform chemicals, where the process comprises the step of: contacting a source of naturally occurring carbohydrates with an acid in the presence of a solvent system comprising from about 60 to 99% of an ethereal solvent, from about 1 to 40% of water, and a co-solvent comprising a C 2 to C 4 carboxylic acid at a temperature and pressure and for a time sufficient to form monomeric sugars, which are then rapidly and/or simultaneously converted into a platform chemical or a plurality of platform chemicals, where an acid concentration is between about 0.02 M and about 1 M and where the platform chemicals include 2-furfural, 5-hydroxymethylfurfural, and levulinic acid with the co-production of formic acid, or mixtures or combinations thereof.