ABE fermentation products recovery methods-A review

Butanol has a great potential as a biofuel and to date a lot of research has been done both in terms of more efficient butanol production as well as in developing product recovery methods. Many of them deal with separation techniques which can be used for selective recovery of acetone, n-butanol and ethanol from model solutions and fermentation broths. This work is a review of techniques used for ABE recovery, such as distillation, adsorption, gas stripping, liquid-liquid extraction, pertraction, membrane distillation, sweeping gas pervaporation, thermopervaporation and vacuum pervaporation. Advantages and disadvantages of using particular methods, examples of applications and integrated processes are also described.