Potential Development and Economic Analysis of Bioethanol Fabrication Design from Oil Palm Biomass with Ionic Liquid Choline Acetate Using SuperPro Designer (SPD) Software

Abstract

The increasing use of energy causes the availability of energy, especially in Indonesia, to be depleted. This condition encourages humans to develop renewable energy sources, one of which is bioethanol, with the availability of abundant raw materials in nature. However, the development of bioethanol is still ineffective because it requires a long time and has high costs. Therefore, a design for bioethanol fabrication from oil palm plantation products with ionic liquid pretreatment using SuperPro Designer (SPD) software was developed. The bioethanol production process was simulated through three stages: pretreatment, enzymatic saccharification, and fermentation. Pretreatment was carried out using the ionic liquid Choline Acetate, after which the results of saccharification and fermentation were analyzed. The results of saccharification showed that around 138 g/L of palm oil was converted into sugar for fermentation. The overall result of the simulation system is that the fermentation process for 12 hours produced 92 g/L ethanol or 96% of the theoretical yield. Meanwhile, ethanol production through fabrication for energy can reduce ethanol prices by 30% from their initial price. This ethanol fabrication design is very supportive of optimizing biomass into bioethanol. Therefore, this design can be used as a recommendation for economical bioethanol production to obtain optimal results in bioethanol production.