Optimization of Saccharification and Fermentation Process in Bioethanol Production from Oil Palm Fronds

Oil Palm Frond (OPF) is one of lignocellulosic biomass, which can be utilized as raw material for bioethanol production. Bioethanol is produced as alternative energy to substitute gasoline. There are four steps in bioethanol production from OPF, i.e pretreatement, saccharification, fermentation and purification process. In this study, optimization of saccharification and fermentation process for OPF was investigated. Two methods and the variations of enzyme concentration were carried out in the saccharification and fermentation process. Separate hydrolysis and fermentation process (SHF) and simultaneous saccharification and fermentation process (SSF) were conducted to produce ethanol optimally. Variations of enzyme concentration used in this process were 10, 20, 30 and 40 FPU/g substrate. The result shows that the highest ethanol concentration can be obtained in SSF process with 30 FPU/g substrate of enzyme concentration. The process produced 59.20 g/L ethanol (95.95% yield ethanol) at 96 h of SSF process.