Improving simultaneous saccharification and fermentation by pre-saccharification and high solids operation for bioethanol production from Eucalyptus globulus bark

abstract

The European Green Deal emerged as a package of policy initiatives for a green transition, aiming to reach climate neutrality by 2050. Accordingly, the pulp and paper industry has been focused on upgrading residues into value-added products within the forest-based circular economy business model. In this context, this study considered the possibility of using bark, a residue available in high volume on factory floors, for cellulosic ethanol production instead of typical burning for energy generation. Bioconversion of lignocellulosic polysaccharides of bark is a challenge and simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (SSF) setup was chosen to boost cellulosic ethanol production. The introduction of a short pre-saccharification (PS) stage (0, 1 and 4 h) in bioethanol production from Eucalyptus globulus bark, previously submitted to a kraft pretreatment, following an integrated configuration, PS-SSF, at the bioreactor scale improved bioethanol concentration. It was observed that the longer pre-saccharification, the higher productivity. Shifting from this batch PS-SSF (4 h) to a fed-batch PSSSF (4 h) configuration allowed to increase the solids loading from 8% to 20% (w/v), raising the final bioethanol concentration from 27.4 to 75.9 g L-1, and improving by itself the overall productivity more than 25%. These results show that in the pulp and paper mills, an integrated biorefinery should be considered to foster the total resources use within the circular economy model.

keywords

BATCH SIMULTANEOUS SACCHARIFICATION; ENZYMATIC-HYDROLYSIS; LIGNOCELLULOSIC BIOMASS; ETHANOL-PRODUCTION; SUGARCANE BAGASSE; PRIMARY SLUDGE; STRATEGIES; ACID; HARDWOOD; DESIGN

subject category

Engineering

authors

Amândio, MST; Rocha, JMS; Xavier, AMRB

our authors

acknowledgements

This work was carried out under the Project InPaCTus - Innovative Products and Technologies from Eucalyptus. Project N.o 21874 funded by Portugal 2020 through European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) in the frame of COMPETE 2020 no246/AXIS II/2017. This work was developed within the scope of the project CICECO-Aveiro Institute of Materials, UIDB/50011/2020, UIDP/50011/2020 & LA/P/0006/2020, financed by national funds through the FCT/MEC (PIDDAC). Authors would also like to thank the CIEPQPF - Strategic Research Centre Project UIDB/00102/2020. funded by the Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia (FCT). The authors are thankful to RAIZ - Instituto de Investigacao da Floresta e do Papel for supplying the pretreated Eucalyptus globulus bark and all the equipment required for the enzymatic hydrolysis.

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