How Do You Break Down Wood to Make Bioethanol? – #365papers – 2017 – 114

#365papers for April 24, 2017

Grigoras, Stroe, Sintamarean, and Rosendahl, 2017, Effect of biomass pretreatment on the product distribution ad composition resulting from the hydrothermal liquefaction of short rotation coppice willow: Bioresource Technology, v. 231, p. 116-123.

What’s it about?

There are lots of ways to pretreat wood in order to optimize the ability to get ethanol out of it. Here, the authors discuss using water, heat, and alkaline solutions to prepare willow for hydrothemal liquifaction to get ethanol out.

Why does it matter?

Pretreatment steps can add expense and waste products to the process of making ethanol. A balance must be made to maximize the total energy extracted from the final product when wastes and expenses are considered.

Why did I read this?

This is the last paper in my ethanol jag. More chemistry. More efficiency. All very interesting.