Producción de furfural y bioetanol a partir de hueso de aceituna

Abstract

Olive stones are a by-product of the olive industry that can be used as a raw material in a biorefinery to obtain biofuels and chemical products of interest. As a general process strategy, a sequential pretreatment in two stages has been proposed, a hydrolysis with dilute acid for the solubilisation of the hemicellulosic fraction and a second pretreatment to increase the enzymatic digestibility of the cellulose, including delignification treatments (alkaline oxidation and organosolvent). Microwave treatment for the production of furfural from xylose-rich acid hydrolysates has been studied and different process configurations for the fermentation of sugars to ethanol have been tested. The presence of phenolic compounds and the precipitation of solubilised lignin have also been evaluated.