Jamaliah Md Jahim

Pollution control technologies for the treatment of palm oil mill effluent (POME) through end-of-pipe processes

Palm oil production is one of the major industries in Malaysia and this country ranks one of the largest productions in the world. In Malaysia, the total production of crude palm oil in 2008 was 17,734,441 tonnes. However, the production of this amount of crude palm oil results in even larger amounts of palm oil mill effluent (POME). In the year 2008 alone, at least 44 million tonnes of POME was generated in Malaysia. Currently, the ponding system is the most common treatment method for POME but other processes such as aerobic and anaerobic digestion, physicochemical treatment and membrane filtration may also provide the palm oil industries with possible insights into the improvement of POME treatment processes. Generally, open ponding offers low capital and operating costs but this conventional method is becoming less attractive because the methane produced is wasted to the atmosphere and the system can not be certified for Carbon Emission Reduction trading. On the other hand, anaerobic digestion of POME provides the fastest payback of investment because the treatment enables biogas recovery for heat generation and treated effluent for land application. Lastly, it is proposed herewith that wastewater management based on the promotion of cleaner production and environmentally sound biotechnologies should be prioritized and included as a part of the POME management in Malaysia for attaining sustainable development. This paper thus discusses and compares state-of-the-art POME treatment methods as well as their individual performances.

A holistic approach to managing palm oil mill effluent (POME): biotechnological advances in the sustainable reuse of POME.

During the last century, a great deal of research and development as well as applications has been devoted to waste. These include waste minimization and treatment, the environmental assessment of waste, minimization of environmental impact, life cycle assessment and others. The major reason for such huge efforts is that waste generation constitutes one of the major environmental problems where production industries are concerned. Until now, an increasing pressure has been put on finding methods of reusing waste, for instance through cleaner production, thus mirroring rapid changes in environmental policies. The palm oil industry is one of the leading industries in Malaysia with a yearly production of more than 13 million tons of crude palm oil and plantations covering 11% of the Malaysian land area. However, the production of such amounts of crude palm oil result in even larger amounts of palm oil mill effluent (POME), estimated at nearly three times the quantity of crude palm oil. Normally, POME is treated using end-of-pipe processes, but it is worth considering the potential value of POME prior to its treatment through introduction of a cleaner production. It is envisaged that POME can be sustainably reused as a fermentation substrate in the production of various metabolites, fertilizers and animal feeds through biotechnological advances. The present paper thus discusses various technically feasible and economically beneficial means of transforming the POME into low or preferably high value added products.

Typical conversion of lignocellulosic biomass into reducing sugars using dilute acid hydrolysis and alkaline pretreatment

Abstract The development and production of fossil fuel alternatives have become one of the main focal points in recent investigations. Lignocellulosic biomass is a renewable source of fermentable sugars for second-generation biofuels and chemicals via biotechnological pathways. However, the presence of lignin and hemicellulose in lignocellulosic biomass makes it difficult for the biomass to be hydrolyzed or digested during fermentation. Thus, effective biomass pretreatment is vital. The present review shows that chemical pretreatment is the current preferred method to obtain high sugar yields at low cost, with dilute acid and alkaline hydrolysis as the two most reported technologies. Dilute acid favours hydrolysis of the hemicelluloses whereas alkaline hydrolysis targets the lignin fraction. Both methods have merits and demerits, and have been combined with other treatments such as hydrothermal and enzymatic hydrolysis. Further investigation is required to improve the pretreatment processes and to ensure the economic viability of bioconversion.

Recent Advances in the Application of Inorganic Salt Pretreatment for Transforming Lignocellulosic Biomass into Reducing Sugars

Currently, the transformation of lignocellulosic biomass into value-added products such as reducing sugars is garnering attention worldwide. However, efficient hydrolysis is usually hindered by the recalcitrant structure of the biomass. Many pretreatment technologies have been developed to overcome the recalcitrance of lignocellulose such that the components can be reutilized more effectively to enhance sugar recovery. Among all of the utilized pretreatment methods, inorganic salt pretreatment represents a more novel method and offers comparable sugar recovery with the potential for reducing costs. The use of inorganic salt also shows improved performance when it is integrated with other pretreatment technologies. Hence, this paper is aimed to provide a detailed overview of the current situation for lignocellulosic biomass and its physicochemical characteristics. Furthermore, this review discusses some recent studies using inorganic salt for pretreating biomass and the mechanisms involved during the process. Finally, some prospects and challenges using inorganic salt are highlighted.

Efficient removal of lignin with the maintenance of hemicellulose from kenaf by two-stage pretreatment process

The enhancement of lignocellulose hydrolysis using enzyme complexes requires an efficient pretreatment process to obtain susceptible conditions for the enzyme attack. This study focuses on removing a major part of the lignin layer from kenaf (Hibiscus cannabinus) while simultaneously maintaining most of the hemicellulose. A two-stage pretreatment process is adopted using calcium hydroxide, Ca(OH)₂, and peracetic acid, PPA, to break the recalcitrant lignin layer from other structural polysaccharides. An experimental screening of several pretreatment chemicals, concentrations, temperatures and solid-liquid ratios enabled the production of an optimally designed pretreatment process for kenaf. Our results showed that the pretreatment process has provide 59.25% lignin removal while maintaining 87.72% and 96.17% hemicellulose and cellulose, respectively, using 1g of Ca(OH)₂/L and a 8:1 (mL:g) ratio of liquid-Ca(OH)₂ at 50 °C for 1.5 h followed by 20% peracetic acid pretreatment at 75 °C for 2 h. These results validate this mild approach for aiding future enzymatic hydrolysis.

Effects of changes in chemical and structural characteristic of ammonia fibre expansion (AFEX) pretreated oil palm empty fruit bunch fibre on enzymatic saccharification and fermentability for biohydrogen

Oil palm empty fruit bunch (OPEFB) fibre is widely available in Southeast Asian countries and found to have 60% (w/w) sugar components. OPEFB was pretreated using the ammonia fibre expansion (AFEX) method and characterised physically by the Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy. The results show that there were significant structural changes in OPEFB after the pretreatment step, and the sugar yield after enzymatic hydrolysis using a cocktail of Cellic Ctec2® and Cellic Htec2® increased from 0.15gg(-1) of OPEFB in the raw untreated OPEFB sample to 0.53gg(-1) of OPEFB in AFEX-pretreated OPEFB (i.e. almost a fourfold increase in sugar conversion), which enhances the economic value of OPEFB. A biohydrogen fermentability test of this hydrolysate was carried out using a locally isolated bacterium, Enterobacter sp. KBH6958. The biohydrogen yield after 72h of fermentation was 1.68mol H2 per mol sugar. Butyrate, ethanol, and acetate were the major metabolites.

Characterisation and performance of three promising heterogeneous catalysts in transesterification of palm oil

In this work, the performance of three heterogeneous catalysts, namely potassium hydroxide/γ-alumina, bulk calcium oxide, and nano-calcium oxide, in comparison with the homogeneous potassium hydroxide was studied in the transesterification of palm oil to produce methyl esters and glycerol. The physical and chemical properties of the heterogeneous catalysts were thoroughly characterised and determined using a number of analytical methods to assess their catalytic activities prior to transesterification. The reaction products were analysed using liquid chromatography and their properties were quantified based on the American Society of Testing and Materials and United State Pharmacopoeia standard methods. At the 65°C reaction temperature, the oil-to-methanol mole ratio of 1: 15, 2.5 h of the reaction time, and catalyst (φr = 1: 40), potassium hydroxide, potassium hydroxide/γ-alumina, nano-calcium oxide, and bulk calcium oxide gave methyl ester yields of 97 %, 96 %, 94 %, and 90 %, respectively. The impregnation of γ-alumina with potassium hydroxide displayed a catalytic performance comparable with the performance of potassium hydroxide where the former could be physically separated via filtration resulting in a relatively greater purity of products. Other advantages included the longer reusability of the catalyst and more active sites with lower by-product formation.

High level expression of Glomerella cingulata cutinase in dense cultures of Pichia pastoris grown under fed-batch conditions

A Pichia pastoris transformant carrying the cutinase cDNA of Glomerella cingulata was over-expressed in a 5L bioreactor (2.0L working volume) under fed-batch conditions. Bioreactor experiments rely on varying selected parameters in repeated rounds of optimisation: here these included duration of induction, pH and temperature. Highest cell densities (320gL(-1) wet cell weight) with a cutinase production of 3800mgL(-1) and an activity of 434UmL(-1) were achieved 24h after induction with methanol in basal salt medium (at pH 5 and 28°C). Characterisation of the cutinase showed that it was stable between pH 6 and pH 11, had an optimum pH of 8.0 and retained activity for 30min at 50°C (optimum temperature 25°C).The preferred substrates of G. cingulata cutinase were the medium- to long-chain ρ-nitrophenyl esters of ρ-nitrophenylcaprylate (C8), ρ-nitrophenyllaurate (C12) and ρ-nitrophenylmyristate (C14), with the highest catalytic efficiency, kcat/Km of 7.7±0.7mM(-1)s(-1) for ρ-nitrophenylcaprylate. Microscopic analyses showed that the G. cingulata cutinase was also capable of depolymerising the high molecular weight synthetic polyester, polyethylene terephthalate.

Physicochemical characteristics of attached biofilm on granular activated carbon for thermophilic biohydrogen production

In this study, thermophilic biohydrogen production by a mixed culture, obtained from a continuous acidogenic reactor treating palm oil mill effluent, was improved by using granular activated carbon (GAC) as the support material. Batch experiments were carried out at 60 °C by feeding the anaerobic sludge bacteria with a sucrose-containing synthetic medium at an initial pH of 5.5 under anoxic conditions. The physico-chemical characteristics of the attached biofilm were evaluated after extraction of the extracellular polymeric substances (EPSs) of the biofilm using the formaldehyde–NaOH method. The main component of the biofilm was protein (60%), while the carbohydrate content accounted for 40% of the EPS. Two major absorption bands at approximately 3400 cm−1 and 1650 cm−1, characteristics of the stretching vibrations of hydroxyl and amino groups, respectively, were identified in the FT-IR spectra, confirming the composition of the EPS. Observations using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) illustrated the attachment of rod-shaped bacterial cells on the GAC at 60 °C. A maximum hydrogen production rate of 4.3 mmol L−1 h−1 and a hydrogen yield of 5.6 mol H2 per mol sucrose were obtained from this attached biofilm system. The major soluble metabolites of fermentation were acetic acid and butyric acid. The results showed that the granular activated carbon enhanced the biohydrogen production by stabilizing the pH and microbial metabolites and therefore could be used as a support material for fermentative hydrogen production under thermophilic conditions on a large scale.

Role of energy irradiation in aiding pretreatment of lignocellulosic biomass for improving reducing sugar recovery

Abstract With the depletion of crude oil reserves, the ever-increasing global energy consumption encourages the efforts to find alternative renewable sources for production of biofuels and value-added chemicals. The conversions of lignocellulosic biomass into biofuels and commodity chemicals via the biotechnological pathway have been the recent trend. Specifically, these products can be obtained through fermentation of reducing sugars, which are the main but basic derivatives from the biomass. In order to overcome the recalcitrant structure of the biomass for effective reducing sugar recovery, a pretreatment stage is normally required. Currently, one of the most novel forms of biomass pretreatment is using energy irradiation methods such as electron beam, gamma ray, pulsed electrical field, microwave and ultrasound. In general, these technologies are often used together with other more conventional chemical and/or biological pretreatment techniques for enhancing sugar recovery. Nevertheless, energy irradiation offers significant improvement in terms of possible cost reduction opportunities and reduced toxicity. Hence, this review highlights the recent studies of using energy irradiation for pretreating biomass as well as the industrial applications of reducing sugars in biotechnological, chemical and fuel sectors. In short, more research needs to be done at the scientific, engineering and economic levels to make energy irradiation one of the front runners in the field of biomass pretreatment.