POTENTIAL OF BANANA PEELS WASTES FOR BIOETHANOL PRODUCTION USING ZYGOSACCHAROMYCES FERMENTATI

Abstract

Banana peels are lignocellulosic agricultural fruit wastes that have the potential to produce bioethanol as a renewable form of energy. The waste utilization plays a vital role to minimize pollution and make possible to utilize the waste. The present study focuses on potential of banana peels wastes for bioethanol production using yeast as a biocatalyst (Zygosaccharomyces fermentati). Pretreatment and hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass are crucial steps in bioethanol production. From the proximate and elemental (CHNS) analysis result shows that banana peels have high H, C and volatile content, lower ash content, and lower values of elements like N, and S. Bioethanol production involves the pretreatment of the raw material, by hydrolysis of cellulose and hemicelluloses to obtain fermentable sugar and the conversion of the sugar into ethanol using Zygosaccharomyces fermentati. Pretreated banana peel waste powder was hydrolyzed by distilled water and by diluting sulfuric acid at different concentrations and different hydrolysis time for constant temperature, in order to optimize the productivity of fermentable sugars. The estimation of fermentable sugars quantity in the pretreated substrate was determined by DNS method. The maximum fermentable sugar from powdered banana peels was achieved in distilled waterhydrolysis with a biomass load of 7.5 g at 24 hours hydrolysis time under optimized conditions. Based on the optimization of bioethanol production, distilled water hydrolyzate and treated at 4 % dilute acid hydrolyzate were selected for fermentation process as a maximum sugar concentration and minimum sugar concentration respectively. In this study the higher sugar content fermented substrate contains 96 % ethanol has an SG of 0.8028 is the nearer to the SG of absolute ethanol about 0.79. Samples were regularly collected from the two fermentation broths for quantitative and qualitative estimation of bioethanol, done by FTIR, SG and determined by dichromate method test. Chemical characterization of the bioethanol produced was performed using FTIR