Kinetic model development and bi-objective optimization of levulinic acid production from sugarcane bagasse

Abstract

The conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to levulinic acid has become a key area of research along the biorefinery theme. Process challenges include the selective production of levulinic acid at high yield as well as the formation of unwanted degradation products called humins. A single-response optimization is not efficient to determine reaction conditions for simultaneous optimum responses of yield and selectivity towards levulinic acid because the responses are related. The objectives of the study were to develop a kinetic model which includes all possible pathways to the formation of humins and subsequent simultaneous optimization of yield and selectivity. The model shows a good fit with literature data with a correlation coefficient of 0.944. The result from the bi-objective optimization shows that at temperature 423 K, acid concentration 0.50 mol/l and time 755 min, optimal yield of 60.3% and a selectivity to LA value of 64% were obtained.