Modelling of pretreatment and saccharification with different feedstocks and kinetic modeling of sorghum saccharification

•Data generated for high temperature alkali pre-treatment of 3 feedstocks.•Effect of parameters studied on delignification extent, Xd & cellulose conversion, X.•Individual and multi-feedstock models developed for Xd and X prediction.•Generalized kinetic model developed for sorghum based enzymatic hydrolysis.•All models shown to be reasonably accurate.

Experiments have been performed for pretreatment of sorghum, wheat straw and bamboo through high temperature alkali pretreatment with different alkaline loading and temperatures, and the data on extent of delignification in terms of the final compositions of cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin have been generated. Further, enzymatic saccharification has been carried out in all the cases to find the extent of conversion possible after 72 h. The effect of different operating parameters on the extent of delignification and cellulose conversion are evaluated. This data is employed to develop a generalized multi-feedstock and individual feedstock based models which can be used to determine the extent of delignification and cellulose conversion for any and specific biomass respectively with alkaline pretreatment and similar enzyme conditions as considered in the present study. Also, a kinetic model is developed and validated for sorghum for cellulosic conversion.