Recovery of cellulose fibers from oil palm empty fruit bunch for pulp and paper using green delignification approach

Yiin CL 1 , Ho S 2 , Yusup S 3 , Quitain AT 4 , Chan YH 2 , Loy ACM 2 Show all authors , Gwee YL 2

Affiliations 

  • 1 Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Computing and Science, Swinburne University of Technology, Jalan Simpang Tiga, Kuching, Sarawak 93350, Malaysia
  • 2 Biomass Processing Cluster, HICOE-Centre for Biofuel and Biochemical Research, Institute of Self-Sustainable Building, Department of Chemical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, Seri Iskandar, Perak 32610, Malaysia
  • 3 Biomass Processing Cluster, HICOE-Centre for Biofuel and Biochemical Research, Institute of Self-Sustainable Building, Department of Chemical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS, Seri Iskandar, Perak 32610, Malaysia. Electronic address: drsuzana_yusuf@utp.edu.my
  • 4 Department of Applied Chemistry and Biochemistry, Faculty of Advanced Science and Technology, Kumamoto University, 2-39-1 Kurokami, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto 860-8555, Japan; International Research Organization for Advanced Science and Technology, Kumamoto University, 2-39-1 Kurokami, Chuo-ku, Kumamoto 860-8555, Japan
Bioresour Technol, 2019 Oct;290:121797.
PMID: 31327691 DOI: 10.1016/j.biortech.2019.121797

Abstract

The aim of this work was to recover the cellulose fibers from EFB using low-transition-temperature-mixtures (LTTMs) as a green delignification approach. The hydrogen bonding of LTTMs observed in 1H NMR tends to disrupt the three-dimensional structure of lignin and further remove the lignin from EFB. Delignification process of EFB strands and EFB powder were performed using standard l-malic acid and cactus malic acid-LTTMs. The recovered cactus malic acid-LTTMs showed higher glucose concentration of 8.07 mg/mL than the recovered l-malic acid LTTMs (4.15 mg/mL). This implies that cactus malic acid-LTTMs had higher delignification efficiency which led to higher amount of cellulose hydrolyzed into glucose. The cactus malic acid-LTTMs-delignified EFB was the most feasible fibers for making paper due to its lowest kappa number of 69.84. The LTTMs-delignified EFB has great potential to be used for making specialty papers in pulp and paper industry.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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