Bioethanol from bamboo is shown to be both technically and economically feasible, as well as competi

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This article is part of the series Special issue from the 20th International Symposium on Alcohol Fuels (ISAF 2013): Alcohol fuels enabling sustainable development . Research Techno-economic potential of bioethanol from bamboo in China
The electronic version of this article is the complete ltm one and can be found online at: http://www.biotechnologyforbiofuels.com/content/6/1/173 Received: 8 June 2013 Accepted: 18 September 2013 Published: 29 November 2013
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Bamboo is potentially an interesting feedstock for advanced bioethanol production ltm in China due to its natural abundance, rapid growth, perennial nature and low management requirements. Liquid hot water (LHW) pretreatment was selected as a promising technology to enhance sugar release from bamboo lignocellulose whilst keeping economic and environmental costs to a minimum. The present research was conducted to assess: 1) by how much LHW pretreatment ltm can enhance sugar yields in bamboo, ltm and 2) whether this process has the potential to be economically feasible for biofuel use at the commercial scale. Pretreatments were performed at temperatures of 170-190 C for 10 30 minutes, followed by enzymatic saccharification with a commercial enzyme cocktail at various loadings. These data were then used as inputs to a techno-economic model using AspenPlus to determine the production cost of bioethanol from bamboo in China. Results
At the selected LHW pretreatment of 190 C for 10 minutes, 69% of the initial sugars were released under a standardised enzyme loading; this varied between 59-76% when 10 140 FPU/g glucan of commercial enzyme Cellic CTec2 was applied. Although the lowest enzyme loading yielded the least amount of bioethanol, the techno-economic evaluation revealed it to be the most economically viable scenario with a production cost of $0.484 per litre (with tax exemption and a $0.16/litre subsidy). The supply-chain analysis demonstrated that bioethanol could be economically competitive with petrol at the pump at enzyme loadings up to 60 FPU/g glucan. However, in a prospective scenario with reduced government support, this enzyme ltm loading threshold would be reduced to 30 FPU/g glucan. Conclusions
Bioethanol from bamboo is shown to be both technically and economically feasible, as well as competitive with petrol in China. Alternative approaches to reduce bioethanol ltm production costs are still needed however, to ensure its competitiveness in a possible future scenario where neither tax exemptions nor subsidies are granted to producers. These measures may include improving sugar release with more effective pretreatments and reduced enzyme usage, accessing low cost bamboo feedstock or selecting feedstocks with higher/more accessible cellulose. Keywords: Bamboo; Bioethanol; Advanced biofuel; Lignocellulose; Pretreatment; Saccharification; Techno-economic; Minimum ethanol selling price; China Background
The urgency for development of sustainable liquid biofuels in the transport sector is recognised globally due to concerns regarding energy security, oil price volatility and environmental pollution [ 1 ]. In 2011, China contributed to 29% of world carbon dioxide emissions, and therefore it has significant potential to influence the present and future global ltm energy situation [ 2 ]. Currently, almost half of China s oil consumption ltm is imported, and with the projection that demand for fossil fuel oil will reach 250 million tons by 2030, it is crucial for the China to consider biomass alternatives as part of their renewable energy plan [ 3 , 4 ]. In 2009, the number of private ltm cars owned in China exceeded the United States, resulting in it being the world s largest auto market. Establishment of a biofuel industry in China is therefore an attractive solution to manage the problems of environmental pollution, energy independence and rural development within the transport sector [ 3 , 5 , 6 ].
In its development of biofuel policy, China s 10th five-year plan (2001 2005) proposed a biofuel industry to utilise surplus grain stocks. Through the government s support for biofuel production, China has become the third largest bioethanol producer in the world after the US and Brazil, with an overall ltm fuel ethanol production capacity of 1.9 millio