Effects of pH, Slurry Composition, and Operating Conditions on Heat Transfer Fouling during Evaporation of a Lignocellulosic Biomass Process Stream

High efficiency and clean separation of eucalyptus components by glycolic acid pretreatment

Glycolic acid has chemical properties similar to those of formic acid. Therefore, similar to formic acid pretreatment, glycolic acid pretreatment has the separation effect of hemicellulose. In this study, eucalyptus hemicellulose was effectively separated by glycolic acid pretreatment. The effects of glycolic acid concentration, temperature and time on the separation of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin were investigated. The optimum conditions were acid concentration 5.40%, temperature 140 °C, time 3.0 h. The highest yield of xylose was 56.72%. The recovery rate of glycolic acid was 91%. Compared to formic acid, the yield of xylose increased to 10.33% while that of lignin decreased to 11.08%. It showed high selectivity for hemicellulose separation, yielding 65.48% hemicellulose with 72.08% purity. The depolymerization and repolymerization of lignin were inhibited. The integrity of the cellulose structure was preserved. It provides theoretical support for the fractional separation and high-value transformation of lignocellulosic biomass.

Continuous enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass with simultaneous detoxification and enzyme recovery

Recovering hydrolysis enzymes and/or alternative enzyme addition strategies are two potential mechanisms for reducing the cost during the biochemical conversion of lignocellulosic materials into renewable biofuels and biochemicals. Here, we show that enzymatic hydrolysis of acid-pretreated pine wood with continuous and/or fed-batch enzyme addition improved sugar conversion efficiencies by over sixfold. In addition, specific activity of the hydrolysis enzymes (cellulases, hemicellulases, etc.) increased as a result of continuously washing the residual solids with removal of glucose (avoiding the end product inhibition) and other enzymatic inhibitory compounds (e.g., furfural, hydroxymethyl furfural, organic acids, and phenolics). As part of the continuous hydrolysis, anion exchange resin was tested for its dual application of simultaneous enzyme recovery and removal of potential enzymatic and fermentation inhibitors. Amberlite IRA-96 showed favorable adsorption profiles of inhibitors, especially furfural, hydroxymethyl furfural, and acetic acid with low affinity toward sugars. Affinity of hydrolysis enzymes to adsorb onto the resin allowed for up to 92 % of the enzymatic activity to be recovered using a relatively low-molar NaCl wash solution. Integration of an ion exchange column with enzyme recovery into the proposed fed-batch hydrolysis process can improve the overall biorefinery efficiency and can greatly reduce the production costs of lignocellulosic biorenewable products.