Sunday, May 4, 2008
1-11

Seaweeds as Novel Feedstocks for Bio Alcohol

Yong Jin Kim1, Hyun Jin Ryu1, Chul Kim1, Myung-Kyo Shin1, Gyung Soo Kim1, Kyeong Keun Oh2, and Jun SeoK Kim3. (1) New&Renewable Energy Team, Environment & Energy Division, Korea Institute of Industrial Technology (KITECH), 35-3 Hongcheon-ri, Ipjangmyeon, Chungnam, 330-825, Korea, Cheonan-si, South Korea, (2) Applied Chemical Engineering, Dankook University, San-29, Anseo-dong, Cheonan, South Korea, (3) Department of Chemical Engineering, Kyonggi University, 94-6 Yiui-dong Yeongtong-gu, Suwon, South Korea

The use of ethanol as an alternative motor fuel steadily increasing around the world. Conventionally, ethanol has been primarily fermented from the mono sugar that makes up the starch in grain. Corn is the source of starch for more than 92% of ethanol production in the United States. In addition, ethanol can be produced from cellulosic biomass, for example, stalks, wheat or rice straw, and wood waste. Switchgrasses are also promising cellulose sources due to their fast-growing characteristic. In spite of their various advantages as biomass for the large-scale production of ethanol, there are several criticisms on the use of food (grain) for the motor fuel regardless of the dying people because of starvation, especially in Africa. In the case of the utilization of cellulosic biomass, the cost is relatively expensive arising from the complicated process due to the presence of lignin which is difficult to remove. Recent advances in the extremely new field of biotechnology for the ethanol production are making it possible to use of macro algal biomass, e.g., red algae, because of their several superior aspects as 3rd generation biomass; no lignin, high contents of carbohydrates as well as very fast-growing rate with the fixation of large amount of CO2, know as a greenhouse gas. In this presentation, we describe in detail the hydrolysis of red algae (seaweed) into mono sugars followed by the fermentation to produce ethanol.

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