Page 35 - cosmos4

There needs to be a plant set up in the vicinity of fields so farmers can easily hand
over the stubble. Ethanol is produced by the fermentation of sugars by certain
microbes. Cellulose as in wheat stubble is a complex carbohydrate, hence it first
needs to be broken down into simpler sugars.

There are 4 basic steps involved in the production of cellulosic ethanol, which are as
follows:

1. Pre-treatment phase-
Here the cellulosic material that is wheat stubble is made amenable to
hydrolysis.
2. Hydrolysis phase-

In this phase the cellulose is hydrolysed using celluloses enzymes to break the
molecules into sugars.
3. Fermentation phase-
Here the sugars are fermented to ethanol using bio-engineered bacteria.
4. Distillation and dehydration phase-
In this final stage 99.5% pure ethanol is produced.

Countries like Denmark, Canada and Australia have
already commercialised the product of cellulosic ethanol
or next generation ethanol. We can do this too. This is

a very good method of using this waste product and
converting it to an energy source. It can be mixed with
petrol or diesel to make them cleaner fuels.