Sunday, August 1, 2010
Pacific Concourse (Hyatt Regency San Francisco)
Higher consumption of fossil fuel has adversely affected climate and reduced the reservoir of fuel. There is an urgent need for the production of cheaper and environmental friendly fuel like bioethanol. Pakistan is being an agriculture country produced a lot of agriculture wastes ever year. The waste materials produced from different sources are not disposed properly. The present study was conducted to utilize the different agro waste including rice polish for the production of biofuels. Firstly, a characterization of the waste was done to determine its moisture, protein, carbohydrate and lignin content. Preliminary pre-treatments were conducted with 0,0.5,1,1.5,2,2.5,3 % dilute sulphuric acid for 15 minutes residence times in autoclave, and their enzymatic hydrolysis conducted with cellulase at 50 OC for 24 hour to obtain glucose as a single product with maximum yield and finally fermentation was done with Saccharomyces cerevisae. The results showed that pretreated sample with 0.5% and 3% and their saccharification has given 121.24mg/ml and 170 mg/ml of glucose recovery. The results obtained after fermentation with Saccharomyces cerevisae and 3% diluted sulphuric acid sample provided better ethanol yield, which will help to produce ethanol on the industrial scale with lower cast.
Keywords: Agricultural Waste, Pretreatment, Rice Polish, ethanol production, Saccharification