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Olive tree wood is an agricultural residue largely available in Portugal. It is estimated that the amount of material annually produced from olive trees pruning, can be up to 250 000 tonnes. This wood resulting from pruning is a material rich in cellulose and hemicelluloses which can be recovered for the production of 2nd generation ethanol through its use as feedstock. Pretreatment is a crucial step in bioconversion of lignocellulosics to bioethanol, in order to improve the carbohydrates accessibility to enzymatic attack. In the present work, the optimization of dilute acid pretreatment conditions of olive tree pruning was studied.

Residues of olive trees pruning need to be removed every year so as not to compromise the health of the fruit (olives). However, at present, despite disposal costs, there is no monetization this waste. Therefore, the use of this waste for the production of cellulosic ethanol could be quite promising. In the present work, the optimization of dilute acid pretreatment conditions of olive tree pruning was studied. A fundamental step in the production of ethanol from lignocellulosic materials is the improvement of the carbohydrates accessibility to enzymatic hydrolysis, which can be performed with physic-chemical pretreatments.

Avaliação do potencial de produção de etanol de 2.ª geração a partir dos resíduos das podas do olival.