Sutikno, Unila Lampung

Potency of agro-industrial waste biomass

for second generation of bio-ethanol production

as petroleum substitution

by Ir. Sutikno, M.Sc., Ph.D,

The University of Lampung, Bandar Lampung. 35145

Sutikno, Unila Lampung

Potency of agro-industrial waste biomass

for second generation of bio-ethanol production

as petroleum substitution
(presented at Sustainable Biofuel Development Researach Workshop, February 4-5, 2009, in Sultan Hotel Jakarta)

Ir. Sutikno, M.Sc., Ph.D,

The University of Lampung, Bandar Lampung. 35145

Introduction
Indonesian fossil fuel reserves decrease steadily. In 1974, Indonesia had fossil fuel reserves of 15.000 metric barrel (MB) and decreased to 5.123 MB in 2000 and to 4.301 MB in 2005 (OPEC, 2005). This was due to exploitation of the fossil fuel for many years and limitation of geology exploration and survey to find out new fossil fuel reserves. Without new fuel reserve addition, Indonesian fossil fuel reserve can only be explored until the year of 2035 (Dartanto, 2005). Meanwhile, Indonesian petroleum consumptions increase significantly. The consumption increase is mostly due to Indonesia population and economic growth (Dartanto, 2005). The petroleum consumption increased from 996.400 barrel daily in 2000 to 1.143.700 barrel daily in the year of 2004 (OPEC, 2005). At the same time, Indonesian petroleum production decreased from 1.272.500 barrel daily in 2000 to 1.094.000 barrel daily in the year of 2004 (Danarto,2005). Thus, in 2004 Indonesia had to import 49.300 barrel petroleum daily to fulfill Indonesian petroleum demands. To overcome fossil fuel reserve depletion and petroleum consumption increase, Indonesian government makes several efforts. One of the government efforts was the establishment of energy policies which were declared in Inpres number 1 in the year of 2006, Inpres number 2 in the year of 2006, and Pepres number 5 in the year of 2006 (Hayun, 2008). The Inpres and Pepres instructed to develop and utilize fuel alternatives for reducing Indonesian dependence on fossil fuel. One of the fuel alternatives is bio-fuel such as bioethanol, biobutanol and biodiesel which utilize biomass as raw materials. The use of biofuel as petroleum-based fuel substitution can improve sustainability and reduce greenhouse gas emissions (Brown et al., 1998; Carere et al., 2008).

Agro-Industrial Waste Biomass

Agro-industrial waste biomass is byproduct of industries which use agricultural products as raw materials. For example, bagasse, palm oil empty bunch (tandan kosong

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kelapa sawit), and rice straw are byproducts of sugar industries, palm oil industries, and paddy plantation, respectively. The agro-industrial byproducts are commonly cell walls which contain lignin, cellulose, and hemicellulose (Gomez et al., 2008). Quintero-Ramirez (2008) stated that cellulose consist of high molecular weight polymers of glucose that are held rigidly together as bundles of fibers to provide material strength; Hemicellulose consists of shorter polymers of various sugars that glue the cellulose bundles together, and lignin providing rigidity to the structure consists of a tri-dimensional polymer of propylphenol that is imbedded in and bound to the hemicellulose (Figure 1). Cellulose, hemi cellulose, and lignin contents of bagasse, oil palm empty bunch, and rice straw are not the same and stated at Table 1.

Figure 1. Polymer structure of lignocellulosic biomass Source : Quintero-Ramirez , 2008. Table 1. Cellulose, hemi cellulose, and lignin contents of agro-industrial waste biomass in Indonesia
No 1 2 3 Kinds of Biomass Rice straw Bagasse Component Content (%) of Biomass Cellulose Hemi Cellulose Lignin 37.71 21.99 16.62 52.70 20.00 24.20 45.80 26.00 Reference Dewi, 2002 Sansuri et al., 2007 Isroi, 2008

Oil palm empty bunch

Agro-industrial waste biomass in Indonesia is abundance and inexpensive and it can fulfill Indonesian transportation fuel demands if it is converted to bioethanol via fermentation. Indonesian paddy production in the year of 2007 was 57.160.000 ton dry milling paddy (Media, 2008). Every ton paddy provides 5 ton rice straw as byproduct (Agustina, 2007 in IPB, 2008). This means that in 2007, total rice straw produced was 5 x 57.160.000 ton = 285.800.000 ton. Rice straw contains 37,71% cellulose, 21,99% hemi

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cellulose, and 24,20% lignin (Dewi, 2002). Based on formula found by Badger (2002), total bioethanol produced from the straw is 45.753.728 kilo litters (kL). This amount of bioethanol has been able to fulfill the Indonesian petroleum consumption which is only 16.418.000 kL in the year of 2004 (Wahid, 2008). With the same approach, total bioethanol which can be generated from oil palm empty bunch and bagasse is 7.872.359 kL and 2.000.000 kL, respectively (Table 2). Table 2 Bioethanol potency generated from agro-industrial waste biomass via microbial fermentation in Indonesia
No 1 2 3

Agro-industrial Waste Biomass Rice Straw (data 2006) Bagasse (data 2002) Oil palm empty bunch (data 2006)

Total (ton/year) 285,800,000 a) 39,539,944 c) 20,750,000

Potensial Ethanol produced (kL) * 45,753,728 b)*$ 7,872,359 d)*

a) b) c)

Reference
Media, 2008

Badger, 2007 Anonim, 2005 d) Badger, 2007

2,000,000 Isroi, 2008

*) Calculated based on formula found by Badger, 2007. $ ) Enough for fulfilling premium demand yearly which was only 16.418.000 kL in the year of 2004 (Wahid, 2008)

Second Generation Bioethanol Production

Unlike the first generation bioethanol which is produced from starchy materials such as corn in the USA (USDA, 2007) (Figure 2) or sugary materials such as sugar cane in Brazil (Badger, 2002), the second generation bioethanol is generated from lignocelluloses (Carere et al., 2008, Gomez et al., 2008, Jagger, 2009). There are four steps to produce second generation bioethanol, i.e. (1) pretreatment of agro-industrial waste biomass, (2) hydrolysis of cellulose and hemicelluloses, (3) fermentation of glucose into bioethanol, and (4) bioethanol recovery (Figure 3). To generate second generation bioethanol, lignocelluloses are collected and then pretreated physically, chemically, biologically or combination among the three approaches. Objectives of the pretreatment are to decrease cellulose crystallinity, increase lignocellulosic surface area, remove hemicellulose, and break lignin seal (Quintero-Ramirez, 2008) so that cellulose and hemicellulose hydrolysis into simple sugars can run maximally. The simple sugars are then fermented by microbes such as Saccharomycess cerevisiae into ethanol solution (Chanda et al., 1995). After recovery and purification,

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bioethanol fulfilling technical specification of transportation fuel is ready to substitute petroleum for transportation.

Figure 2. Steps of first generation bioethanol production from corn Source : McCoy, 1998.

Figure 3. Steps of second generation bioethanol production from agricultural waste biomass Source : Knauf and Moniruzzaman, 2004. Up to now, the production cost of second generation bioethanol is still high; A Key to unlocking low cost the second generation bioethanol is a pretreatment step which provides significant effects on the other steps (Figure 4). The pretreatment generally refers to the disruption of the naturally resistant carbohydrate-lignin shield that limits the accessibility of enzymes to cellulose and hemicellulose (Yan and Wyman, 2008).

Figure 4. A simplified process flow diagram for biological conversion of cellulosic biomass to ethanol illustrating potential effects of pretreatment on other operation

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Source : Yang and Wyman, 2008. However, the choice of pretreatment technology is not trivial and must take into account sugar-release patterns and solid concentrations for each pretreatment in conjunction with their compatibility with the overall process, feedstock, enzymes, and organisms to be applied. Therefore, researches to find out the best pretreatment for certain agroindustrial waste biomass in Indonesia should be carried out intensively and Indonesian New & Renewable Energy Society (METI) should coordinate and communicate among Indonesian researchers in order to realize production in commercial scale of the second generation bioethanol in Indonesia in efficient and effective ways. It is hoped that Indonesia which has huge and cheap waste biomasses can catch up other country progress such as Brazil which has build several pilot plants of the second generation bioethanol from sugar cane bagasse in the year of 2009 (Jagger, 2009).

Conclusion
Productions of the second generation bioethanol from agro-industrial waste biomass are essential in order to overcome our excessive dependence on petroleum for liquid fuels and also to address the build-up of greenhouse gases that cause global climate change. Biological conversion offers a potential for radical technical advances through application of the powerful tools of modern biotechnology to realize truly low costs. However, pretreatment step is the key cost element in the biological conversion of agroindustrial waste biomass to bioethanol or other products, such as biobutanol, that still require low cost sugars to be cost competitive. In addition, pretreatment step can have invasive impacts on the performance and cost of virtually all other operation steps. Thus, pretreatment steps must be advanced and carefully integrated with the rest of the process to realize the full potential of cellulosic ethanol or other biologically derived products. Although a wide range of pretreatment approaches have been conducted over the years, only a few achieve the high yields of sugars from biomass with low enough costs to be considered attractive, and all of them rely on chemical addition. Unfortunately, relatively little funding has targeted advancing either the technologies or their understanding, impeding significant breakthroughs that reduce cost and more confident commercial applications. It is now time for far more aggressive and intensive to carry out fundamental and applied

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researches on the pretreatment step and its integration with the rest of the second generation bioethanol process.

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