Abstract
In this study, effects of different pretreatment methods on the enzymatic digestibility of Pennisetum alopecuroides, a ubiquitous wild grass in China, were investigated to evaluate its potential as a feedstock for biofuel production. The stalk samples were separately pretreated with H2SO4, NaOH and FeCl3 solutions of different concentrations at 120 °C for 30 min, after which enzymatic hydrolysis was conducted to measure the digestibility of pretreated samples. Results demonstrated that different pretreatments were effective at removing hemicellulose, among which ferric chloride pretreatment (FCP) gave the highest soluble sugar recovery (200.2 mg/g raw stalk) from the pretreatment stage. In comparison with FCP and dilute acid pretreatment (DAP), dilute alkaline pretreatment (DALP) induced much higher delignification and stronger morphological changes of the biomass, making it more accessible to hydrolysis enzymes. As a result, DALP using 1.2% NaOH showed the highest total soluble sugar yield through the whole process from pretreatment to enzymatic hydrolysis (508.5 mg/g raw stalk). The present work indicates that DALP and FCP have the potential to enhance the effective bioconversion of lignocellulosic biomass like P. alopecuroides, hence making this material a valuable and promising energy plant.
Highlights
With the growth of vehicles and an over-reliance on fossil fuels in industrial development, biofuel production from non-food crop feedstocks has drawn considerable attention [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8]
The P. alopecuroides samples were subjected to different pretreatments, including dilute acid pretreatment (DAP), dilute alkaline pretreatment (DALP) and ferric chloride pretreatment (FCP)
A P. alopecuroides sample pretreated by DALP had a higher solid yield as compared with those pretreated with DAP and FCP
Summary
With the growth of vehicles and an over-reliance on fossil fuels in industrial development, biofuel production from non-food crop feedstocks (e.g. agricultural residues, forest residues and industrial wastes) has drawn considerable attention [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8]. In China, anaerobic digestion of organic wastes has been successfully used for biogas production both domestically, as well as at a larger scale [2,3,4,5,6]. Different biomass substrates, such as cornstalk, rice straw, wheat straw and pine foliage, have been investigated for the production of bioethanol [9,10,11,12]. High yield, high adaptability, low cost and environmentally benign production, P, alopecuroides was selected as a substrate in the current study to evaluate its application prospects in biofuel production
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