A strategy for determining the chemical composition of rice straw

Abstract

As rice is the staple food of most Asian countries, rice straw has become one of the largest agricultural wastes in Asia. It has not been subjected to adequate value additions yet. However, it has excellent potential to be converted to valuable materials, as it contains a significant amount of cellulose. Therefore, it would be beneficial in many ways to identify the cellulose yields of straws of different rice varieties. In general, the cellulose content of biomass is determined by wet chemical methods. Though these methods are accurate, they are not convenient to use under industrial conditions. This research work focuses on investigating the potential of thermal analysis as an alternative way to predict cellulose yields. For the study, rice straws of most frequently cultivated traditional Sri Lankan rice varieties: Suwandel and Raththal, as well as technically modified Sri Lankan rice varieties: BG300 and BG352, were selected. The results obtained by the proposed method were validated by an established three-step chemical extraction process.