WASTE TO ENERGY: FERMENTATION OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE TO PRODUCE BIOETHANOL

Abstract

Recent focus on energy sector has been switched from non-renewable fossil fuels to renewable biofuels due
to former’s harmful impact on environment. There are various biofuels and each has its own production methodology but
all these eco-friendly fuels have similar contribution towards growing energy demand and sustainable development. The
growing awareness about utilization of fossil fuels and their impact on atmosphere, leads to the use of fuels derived from
biodegradable organic waste which results in lowering carbon footprints, reducing greenhouse gas emission, reducing
dependency on fossil fuels, providing economic security and lowering level of pollution compared to the non-renewable
fossil fuels. Some of these green fuels are bioethanol, biogasoline, bio-diesel, biohydrogen, biogas, etc., derived from
agricultural waste, food waste, algae, etc. Our work mainly focuses on bioethanol as a biofuel as it has some significant
advantages such as its capability to replace gasoline and to achieve the carbon emission goals under Kyoto Protocol.
Another reason for use of bioethanol over other biofuels is that it can be potentially used as transportation fuel with
minimal or no modifications in the existing vehicular engines. Bioethanol as a biofuel is an alcohol produced by the
fermentation of biomass such as agricultural, food and municipal solid waste and can also be effectively blended with
petrol or gasoline. Bioethanol has similar properties to that of ethanol and therefore, it can be also used as solvent in
various industrial and laboratory applications. It has been found that after significant fermentation and treatment 41-
46% of bioethanol can be produced and can resolve the mentioned problem of supply. Thus, this paper primarily focuses
on the production of bioethanol by comparing different types of feedstocks and properties of each sample of bioethanol
produced from these available feedstocks