Toilet Paper Ethanol: Biofuel Production from Lignocellulose Sources

Abstract

As demand for green energy sources has increased, ethanol based biofuels have become an emerging renewable source of energy to replace fossil fuels. One source of interest is lignocellulose based biofuels from bio waste such as yard waste, food waste, and paper products. We are testing the efficiency of bioethanol production from feed sources from each of these categories, utilizing an alkali chemical pretreatment, enzymatic hydrolysis of cellulose, saccharomyces cerevisiae fermentation, fractional distillation, and azeotropic distillation. We expect that while yard waste is likely to be the most abundant supply source, it will likely have the lowest yield given the very strong cellulose fibers found in most yard waste. In contrast paper products will have the highest bioethanol yield given the relatively weaker cellulose polymers, but is the least abundant supply source. Food waste may provide a happy medium between bioethanol yield and supply source abundance, given the high glucose concentration found in most food waste before pretreatment.

Details

Session 2

3:00pm – 4:30pm

Grand Salon