Latvian Scientists Make Bioethanol and Furfural from Straw

by Olga Pavuk (The Baltic Course) Production of bioethanol is an alternative energy source of utmost importance in replacing ordinary fuel made from hydrocarbons. Latvian scientists have succeeded in producing bioethanol and furfural from plant waste – wheat straw. Co-generation of the two products – ethanol and furfural – is what makes their method unique.

This was the subject of the research by a group of Latvian scientists headed by Prof. Alexander Rapoport (Aleksandrs Rapoports) from the University of Latvia Institute of Microbiology and Biotechnology, Corresponding Member of the Latvian Academy of Sciences, and Prof. Nikolay Vedernikov (Nikolajs Vederņikovs) from the Latvian State Institute of Wood Chemistry, Academician of the Latvian Academy of Sciences. Their objective was to develop technologies utilizing basic local resources – waste generated by agricultural and wood-processing industries. As part of a project financed from the European Regional Development Fund (project 2014/0026/2DP/2.1.1.1.0/14/APIA/VIAA/002) carried out over the past year they succeeded in showing the possibilities for making bioethanol from wheat straw which the agricultural sector discards in vast amounts every year.

It is very important that the technology uses not just a local Latvian resource but a resource available in practically all developed European countries which could also benefit from this unique method, if they so wished. The project of the Latvian scientists is titled ”Biotechnological basis for the simultaneous production of bioethanol and furfural from wheat straw”. Co-generation of the two products – ethanol and furfural – is what makes their method unique.

Ethanol and furfural are two main components that can be used for a variety of syntheses in chemical industry. About 95% of all synthetic materials produced in modern times can be created using these two chemical compounds that can be obtained from renewable plant biomass.

Considering that in the nearest future ethanol apparently is going to be used mostly as an alternative energy source to oil, furfural becomes one of the main substitutes for oil as a resource in the chemical industry. Today large amounts of furfural are already being generated across the world from renewable plant material – the same material that can be used to produce ethanol. What’s most interesting is that both those products can be obtained from different parts of the same plant material – furfural from five-carbon units and ethanol from six-carbon units.

Thorough research conducted by Prof. Nikolay Vedernikov for many years has opened a chance to change the mechanism of furfural formation to exclude permanent damage to residual cellulose.

Microbiologists immediately made use of this discovery and proved that the substrate left after furfural formation can be effectively turned into glucose. To this end, it has to be treated with advanced commercial enzymes – cellulases – which were kindly supplied for this research by DuPont company. What comes next is very simple – the quite “traditional” microbiological process of using yeast to generate alcohol. Nevertheless, the Latvian scientists made some rather significant modifications also to this phase to increase the economic efficiency of this “traditional” process.

The Latvian scientists also came up with another innovation. Once you have obtained furfural and alcohol, you are left with one more component of plant material – lignin. A group of researchers headed by Ass. Prof. Natalya Matjuskova (Nataļja Matjuškova) established that lignin can be effectively used to grow shiitake mushrooms which have recently come into vogue and contain biologically active and healthy substances. READ MORE