Dilute Sulphuric Acid Pre-treatment for Efficient Production of Bioethanol from Sugarcane Bagasse using Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Abstract

In the present study, the effect of dilute acid hydrolysis during the pre-treatment of sugarcane bagasse (SCB) was conducted using sulphuric acid of various concentrations. A high concentration of reducing sugar of 270.90 g/L was achieved by soaking bagasse in 0.5M of H2SO4 at a constant temperature of 120 oC. After the pre-treatment (saccharification), the reducing sugars obtained at the different concentrations were fermented by Saccharomyces cerevisiae mono-culture modes. The results indicated that, the pre-treated SCB treated with 0.5M H2SO4 produced the highest yield of ethanol which was 8.884 g/L with a productivity of 0.134 g/L/h. However, relatively low ethanol yield was found when 0.2M H2SO4 was used which yielded 8.2185 g/L. In any case, acid hydrolysis proves to be a better method of hydrolysis and an increase in the concentration during hydrolysis contributes to higher sugar yield and subsequently higher ethanol yields.