Mechanical Pretreatment of Lignocellulosic Biomass for Biofuel Production

Abstract

Lignocellulosic biomass (LB) sources which are readily available in abundance are widely considered as a potential future sustainable raw materials for biofuel production. Typically, biofuel production involved several chemical and mechanical steps consisting of pretreatment, hydrolysis, fermentation and separation. The pretreatment step is considered as one of the most vital part of the whole processing scheme due to the impact it had on the efficiency of the subsequent processing steps. In this study we reviewed the mechanical pretreatment of LB focusing mainly on the size reduction technique by grinding process. Grinding is one of the proven preliminary pretreatment techniques employed in biomass conversion to liquid biofuel. However, this technique is known to be costly due to high energy consumption. In view of this, an efficient and cost effective pretreatment technology is required in order for the biofuel to be produced at a competitive level. At the same time, the impact on environment caused by the conventional pretreatment processes can be minimized. Thus, a new combined chemical-mechanical pretreatment is considered whereby a green ionic liquid (IL) solvent is introduced.