Evaluation of Ionic Liquids as In Situ Extraction Agents during the Alcoholic Fermentation of Carob Pod Extracts

Anhydrous ethanol is a promising alternative to gasoline in fuel engines. However, since ethanol forms an azeotrope with water, high-energy-consumption separation techniques such as azeotropic distillation, extractive distillation, and molecular sieves are needed to produce anhydrous ethanol. This w...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Sánchez Segado, Sergio, Salar García, María José, Ortiz Martínez, Víctor Manuel, Pérez de los Ríos, Antonia, Hernández Fernández, Francisco José, Lozano Blanco, Luis Javier
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2019
País:España
Institución:Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena(UPCT)
Repositorio:Repositorio Digital UPCT
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.upct.es:10317/9311
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10317/9311
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Carob pod
Bioethanol
Extractive distillation
Ionic liquids
Biocompatibility
Liquid–liquid extraction
Tecnología de los Alimentos
3309 Tecnología de Los Alimentos
2414 Microbiología
Descripción
Sumario:Anhydrous ethanol is a promising alternative to gasoline in fuel engines. However, since ethanol forms an azeotrope with water, high-energy-consumption separation techniques such as azeotropic distillation, extractive distillation, and molecular sieves are needed to produce anhydrous ethanol. This work discusses the potential development of an integrated process for bioethanol production using ionic liquids and Ceratonia siliqua as a carbohydrate source for further fermentation of the aqueous extracts. A four-stage counter-current system was designed to improve the sugar extraction yield to values close to 99%. The alcoholic fermentation of the extracts showed ethanol concentrations of 95 g/L using the microorganism Saccharomyces cerevisae. The production of anhydrous ethanol through extractive distillation with ethylene glycol was simulated using CHEMCAD software, with an energy consumption of 13.23 MJ/Kg of anhydrous ethanol. Finally, several ionic liquids were analyzed and are proposed as potential solvents for the recovery of bioethanol for the design of an integrated extraction-fermentation-separation process, according to their ability to extract ethanol from aqueous solutions and their biocompatibility with the microorganism used in this study.