Abstract
The global sugar industry is stagnating due to oversupply of international markets, which requires investments in product diversification. Health concerns have also been raising questions about sugar as a sweetener. This study investigated the viability of producing alternative, low-calorie sweeteners in a sugarcane-mill-annexed biorefinery, utilising A-molasses as feedstock. Single-product and multiproduct biorefineries were simulated in Aspen Plus® to produce isomaltulose, allulose, short-chain fructooligosaccharides (scFOS) and/or thaumatin. The minimum selling prices of isomaltulose (870 $/ton), allulose (2030 $/ton) and scFOS (1540 $/ton) in the single-product biorefineries were lower than current market prices, while that of thaumatin (11 665 000 $/ton) was higher. However, single-product biorefineries would oversupply the market. In multiproduct scenarios the available A-molasses was shared between isomaltulose, allulose and scFOS in one biorefinery, to produce ≤15% of the global market for each, using either six bioreactors operated continuously, or one bioreactor shared between six process steps through scheduling. The shared-one-bioreactor had a higher deterministic IRR (60%) than the six-bioreactor scenario (50%). Stochastic financial analysis confirmed the higher IRR for the shared-one-bioreactor (41.39%) compared to the six-bioreactor (36.07%) scenario, reflecting price variabilities’ impact on biorefinery profitability. Multiproduct scenarios were deemed economically attractive for A-molasses diversion from a typical sugarcane mill.
Published Version
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call