Abstract
Almond pruning biomass is an important agricultural residue that has been scarcely studied for the co-production of sugars and solid biofuels. In this work, the production of monosaccharides from almond prunings was optimised by a two-step process scheme: pretreatment with dilute sulphuric acid (0.025M, at 185.9-214.1℃ for 0.8-9.2min) followed by enzyme saccharification of the pretreated cellulose. The application of a response surface methodology enabled the mathematical modelling of the process, establishing pretreatment conditions to maximise both the amount of sugar in the acid prehydrolysate (23.4kg/100kg raw material, at 195.7℃ for 3.5min) and the enzymatic digestibility of the pretreated cellulose (45.4%, at 210.0℃ for 8.0min). The highest overall sugar yield (36.8kg/100kg raw material, equivalent to 64.3% of all sugars in the feedstock) was obtained with a pretreatment carried out at 197.0℃ for 4.0min. Under these conditions, moreover, the final solids showed better properties for thermochemical utilisation (22.0MJ/kg heating value, 0.87% ash content, and 72.1mg/g moisture adsorption capacity) compared to those of the original prunings.
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