Effect of Chemical Pre-treatments on Bioethanol Production from Chlorella minutissima

Abstract

In recent years, algal bioethanol production comes into prominence as a trend towards sustainable development. Due to being sustainable energy source and environmental friendly, bioethanol production from algae is becoming increasingly popular all over the world. However, yield of bioethanol production from algae is lower than first generation feedstock's currently, and needs to be improved. In order to increase bioethanol yield, pre-treatments should be performed as cell disruption process on algal biomass. For this reason, researchers investigate the most appropriate pre-treatment method and its parameters for high yield bioethanol production from algae. In this study, cultivated Chlorella minutissima was utilized for bioethanol production. Effects of pre-treatment method (dilute acid and alkaline), chemical concentration, pre-treatment temperature and pre-treatment time on bioethanol yield were investigated. It was found that, the highest bioethanol yield was obtained as 18.52% with acid pre-treatment at pre-treatment temperature of 100 degrees C and pre-treatment time of 60 minutes.