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Several efforts have been made during the last three decades to develop successful lignocellulose-based technologies for the production of fuels and chemicals. However, such technologies still seemed to be emerging, because of the high technical risks involved and huge capital investments. This paper describes a holistic approach toward utilization of sugar cane bagasse as lignocellulosic feedstock into fuel (ethanol), chemical (furfural), and energy (electricity), using a biorefinery approach instead of co-generation. The proposed scheme could be integrated with existing sugar or paper mills, where the availability of biomass feedstock is in abundance. Fermentable sugar components (xylose and glucose) from sugar cane bagasse have been extracted employing acid hydrolysis and enzymatic saccharification. Recovery and reuse of saccharifying enzyme was a major process advantage. The pentose fraction was efficiently utilized for yeast biomass generation and furfural production. High-temperature fermentation of a hexose stream by thermophilic yeast Kluyveromyces sp. IIPE453 (MTCC 5314) with cell recycle produced ethanol with an overall yield of 88% ± 0.05% and a productivity of 0.76 ± 0.02 g/L h–1. A complete material balance on two consecutive process cycles, each starting with 1 kg of feedstock, resulted in an overall yield of 366 mL of ethanol, 149 g of furfural, and 0.30 kW of electricity.

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Experimental results on the etherification of glycerol by isobutylene using Indion-130 catalyst are presented. Experiments were carried out at five different temperatures between 45 and 85 °C in an autoclave with mechanical stirring. Isobutylene was produced in situ from tert-butyl alcohol in another autoclave connected in series. Experiments were conducted for a duration of 24 h with sample collection (for analysis) every 2 h. Samples were analyzed by gas chromatography for monitoring mono-, di-, and tri-tert-butyl glycerol ethers (MTBG, DTBG, and TTBG). The studies reveal that the optimal temperature for maximum production of DTBG is 55 °C. A multilump kinetic model has been developed, and global rate constants have been evaluated.

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