Recyclability of an ionic liquid for biomass pretreatment

Piyarat Weerachanchai, Jong Min Lee*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

93 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

This study investigated the possibility of reusing an ionic liquid for the pretreatment of biomass. The effects of lignin and water content in a pretreatment solvent on pretreatment products were examined, along with the recyclability of an ionic liquid for pretreatment. It was discovered that the presence of lignin and water within a pretreatment solvent resulted in a far less effective pretreatment process. 1-Ethyl-3-methylimidazolium acetate/ethanolamine (60/40vol%) presents more promising properties than EMIM-AC, providing a small decrease in sugar conversion and also a small increase of lignin deposition with an increasing lignin amount in the pretreatment solvent. Deteriorations of the ionic liquid were observed from considerably low sugar conversions and lignin extraction after using the 5th and 7th batch, respectively. Furthermore, the changes of ionic liquid properties and lignin accumulation in ionic liquid were determined by analyzing their thermal decomposition behavior (TGA) and chemical functional groups (FTIR and 1H NMR).

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)336-343
Number of pages8
JournalBioresource Technology
Volume169
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Oct 2014
Externally publishedYes

ASJC Scopus Subject Areas

  • Bioengineering
  • Environmental Engineering
  • Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment
  • Waste Management and Disposal

Keywords

  • Biomass
  • Ionic liquid
  • Pretreatment
  • Recycle
  • Reuse

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