Mild sodium hydroxide pretreatment of tobacco product waste to enable efficient bioethanol production by separate hydrolysis and fermentation

Abstract

Tobacco product waste (TPW) was considered as a novel and sustainable feedstock for second-generation ethanol production. TPW with over ~ 44% cellulose content was efficiently pretreated using concentrated (10% W/V) sodium hydroxide (SH) solution at different temperatures (0, 25, and 80 °C) and retention times (3 and 6 h). Subsequently, the pretreated biomass was subjected to separate enzymatic hydrolysis and fermentation by the filamentous fungus Mucor hiemalis. Promising results were achieved following 3 h pretreatment of TPW at 80 °C, whereas the hydrolysis yield was substantially increased up to 91.3%. Besides, comprehensive tacking of key features of biomass (e.g., composition, crystalline structure, surface hydrophilicity and morphology, and accessible surface area) by semi-quantitative methods together with FTIR and SEM observations revealed major improvements occurred after mild SH pretreatment. Consequently, the maximum ethanol production as high as ~ 97% of theoretical ethanol yield was obtained, while it was only 44.4% from the untreated TPW. The implication of the work could possibly support TPW utilization for large-scale ethanol production in a tobacco-based biorefinery framework.