Microfibrillated cellulose from agricultural residues. Part I: Papermaking application

• The aim of the present study was to replace imported wood pulp by MFC prepared from Egyptian agricultural by-products.
• Our research will show innovation in using MFC from the waste and will impact new activities to the paper companies, not only in Egypt, but also in other countries that are rare in wood pulp.
• In this study, MFC from rice straw, bagasse and cotton stalk fibers was prepared by mechanical disintegration of cellulosic materials after pretreatment with sodium hydroxide and sodium sulfite.

Due to their abundance, nano-scalecellulose fiber materials such as microfibrillated cellulose, serve as promising candidates for nanocomposite production. Such new high-value materials are the subject of continuing research of new products from the pulp and paper industry sector. Microfibrillated cellulose (MFC) is generally considered to be composed of fibrils with diameter in the range of 10–100 nm liberated from larger plant based cellulose fibers and have a broad range of potential applications. In this work, we evaluated the preparation of MFC from biomass wastes using a new chemical pretreatment method before applying the traditional mechanical method. Rice straw, bagasse and cotton stalk biomass wastes used in this study were chemically treated with sodium hydroxide-sodium sulphite in order to remove lignin, hemicelluloses and to isolate cellulose, which was our starting material for the preparation of MFC. MFC was isolated from the bleached materials by mechanical treatment and the resulting materials were named MFCE30. The resulting MFCE30 were characterized by optical and scanning electron microscopies (SEM), Fourier Transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and X-Ray diffraction. Composite paper sheet samples were prepared from bleached rice straw and bagasse pulps by adding different percentages of MFCE30 and both mechanical and optical properties of the resulting papers were studied. These properties were compared with those of paper sheets conventionally prepared in the pulp and paper Egyptian industry by adding 20% wood pulp as additive.

Figure optionsDownload as PowerPoint slide