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Poster Presentation 3-33
Conversion of Bagasse to Mixed Carboxylic Acids Using a Mixed Culture of Mesophilic Microorganisms
Piyarat Thanakoses and Mark T. Holtzapple
Department of Chemical Engineering, Texas A&M University College Station, Texas 77843-3122
Telephone: (979) 862-4558; Fax: (979) 845-6446; E-mail: jeabpiyarat@hotmail.com
Agriculture is an economic foundation for many countries. With improved technology, agricultural production increases every year, but also more wastes are generated. Converting waste biomass into liquid fuels has attractive environmental benefits, such as reducing the greenhouse effect and increasing resource availability. Using the MixAlco process, biomass can be converted into carboxylic acids, which can be chemically converted into mixed alcohol fuels. This paper focuses on using countercurrent fermentation to anaerobically convert sugarcane baggase and chicken manure to mixed carboxylic acids using a mixed culture of mesophilic microorganisms. Bagasse is treated with lime to increase digestibility before entering the fermentors. The continuum particle distribution model (CPDM) is used to simulate continuous fermentors based on data collected from batch experiments. This model saves considerable time in determining optimum operating conditions. For 80% bagasse/20% chicken manure at a volatile solid loading rate (VSLR) of 7.2 g/L/d and a liquid residence time (LRT) of 7.7 d, total carboxylic acid productivity, total acid selectivity and yield were 2.5 g/L/d, 0.58 g total acid/g VS digested and 0.34 total acid/g VS fed, respectively.
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