Biobutanol Production from Agricultural
Biomass
4
Nurul Haziqah Alias, Mohamad Faizal Ibrahim,
Muhammad Siddiq Mohamed Salleh, Mohd Azwan Jenol,
Suraini Abd-Aziz, and Lai Yee Phang
Abstract
Biobutanol, an alcoholic biofuel with 4-carbon atoms is one of the potential
biofuels to replace petrol fuel. Biobutanol has higher density, higher energy
content, and less corrosive as compared to bioethanol. Biobutanol also has similar
characteristic as gasoline, therefore, it can be distributed in the current storage and
pipeline system and used in a car’s engine without any modifications. Biobutanol
can be produced through fermentation process by commonly used microorganism, Clostridium sp. This species can consume both hexose and pentose sugars
that can be derived from agricultural biomass. Agricultural biomass is considered
as the most abundant material that can be continuously supplied as substrate for
fermentation. This material is composed of cellulose and hemicellulose as polysaccharide building blocks made of sugar and protected by the lignin made of
various types of phenolic components. The arrangement of these components in
plant cell wall makes the plant material difficult to be degraded. Therefore,
various technologies have been developed in order to utilize agricultural biomass
as substrate for fermentation. In this chapter, how agricultural biomass is
converted into biobutanol will be presented and discussed. The processes
involved include preparation of the substrate and medium formulation, microorganism and inoculum preparation, fermentation operation, and the recovery
process.
Keywords
Agricultural biomass · Biobutanol · ABE fermentation
N. H. Alias · M. F. Ibrahim (*) · M. S. M. Salleh · M. A. Jenol · S. Abd-Aziz · L. Y. Phang
Department of Bioprocess Technology, Faculty of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences,
Universiti Putra Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia
e-mail: faizal_ibrahim@upm.edu.my
# Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2021
V. Venkatramanan et al. (eds.), Sustainable Bioeconomy,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7321-7_4
67
Biomass
4
Nurul Haziqah Alias, Mohamad Faizal Ibrahim,
Muhammad Siddiq Mohamed Salleh, Mohd Azwan Jenol,
Suraini Abd-Aziz, and Lai Yee Phang
Abstract
Biobutanol, an alcoholic biofuel with 4-carbon atoms is one of the potential
biofuels to replace petrol fuel. Biobutanol has higher density, higher energy
content, and less corrosive as compared to bioethanol. Biobutanol also has similar
characteristic as gasoline, therefore, it can be distributed in the current storage and
pipeline system and used in a car’s engine without any modifications. Biobutanol
can be produced through fermentation process by commonly used microorganism, Clostridium sp. This species can consume both hexose and pentose sugars
that can be derived from agricultural biomass. Agricultural biomass is considered
as the most abundant material that can be continuously supplied as substrate for
fermentation. This material is composed of cellulose and hemicellulose as polysaccharide building blocks made of sugar and protected by the lignin made of
various types of phenolic components. The arrangement of these components in
plant cell wall makes the plant material difficult to be degraded. Therefore,
various technologies have been developed in order to utilize agricultural biomass
as substrate for fermentation. In this chapter, how agricultural biomass is
converted into biobutanol will be presented and discussed. The processes
involved include preparation of the substrate and medium formulation, microorganism and inoculum preparation, fermentation operation, and the recovery
process.
Keywords
Agricultural biomass · Biobutanol · ABE fermentation
N. H. Alias · M. F. Ibrahim (*) · M. S. M. Salleh · M. A. Jenol · S. Abd-Aziz · L. Y. Phang
Department of Bioprocess Technology, Faculty of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences,
Universiti Putra Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia
e-mail: faizal_ibrahim@upm.edu.my
# Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2021
V. Venkatramanan et al. (eds.), Sustainable Bioeconomy,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7321-7_4
67