Bacterial conversion of lignocellulose to ethanol

Conference · Tue Oct 01 04:00:00 EDT 1996

OSTI ID:370934

Ingram, L O ^[1]

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1. Univ. of Florida, Gainesville, FL (United States)

Technologies for fuel ethanol production from lignocellulose are currently available. The challenge today is to assemble these technologies into a commercial demonstration plant. Bacteria such as Escherichia coli strain KO11 have been specifically engineered to produce ethanol at greater than 90% of theoretical yield (40 g ethanol/L in 48 h) from all sugar constituents in hemicellulose (pentoses and hexoses). Methods have been developed to produce fermentable hemicellulose syrups containing high concentrations of sugars. The effectiveness of strain KO11 has been demonstrated with hemicellulose syrups at the 150-liter scale and with laboratory sugars at the 10,000-liter scale. Additional organisms such as Klebsiella oxytoca strain P2 have been engineered for the simultaneous saccharification and fermentation of cellulose (SSF). Cellulase enzymes is one of the major costs associated with all SSF processes. The new organisms eliminate the need for added cellobiase and in some cases produce part of the endoglucanase. Strain P2 has been tested with bagasse, purified cellulose and mixed waste office paper. A simple method of enzyme recycling was tested using strain P2 with office paper as a substrate. Ethanol yields were prejected to be over 539 liters per metric ton. With onsite production, the estimated cost of cellulose for this process is 8.5 cents (U.S.) per liter.

• OSTI ID: 370934
• Report Number(s): CONF-960376--
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

09 BIOMASS FUELS
55 BIOLOGY AND MEDICINE
BASIC STUDIES
BIOSYNTHESIS
CELLULASE
ENZYMES
ESCHERICHIA COLI
ETHANOL
ETHANOL FUELS
FERMENTATION
HEMICELLULOSE
HEXOSES
KLEBSIELLA
PENTOSES
SACCHARIFICATION