Multi-Criteria Analysis of Lignocellulose Substrate Pre-Treatment

Abstract

Due to growing topicality of indirect land use change, greater shift towards second generation biofuels should be observed. In order to help smaller biogas and bioethanol producers, multi-criteria analysis of lignocellulose pre-treatment is conducted to elucidate the most preferable approach for lignocellulose pre-treatment. There are four main pre-treatment groups – biological, chemical, physical and physochemical pre-treatment. In this article three pre-treatment types were described by highlighting their specific approaches; using multi-criteria analysis a conclusion was reached that the most preferable pre-treatment option for lignocellulose biomass like corn stover or sugarcane is microbiological pre-treatment, as it showed the closest proximity to ideal solution.

Keywords

• biological pre-treatment
• corn stover
• microwave pre-treatment
• simple sugars
• sugarcane bagasse