Análise ambiental da produção de xilooligossacarídeos (XOS) em biorrefinarias de cana-de açúcar

Abstract

Xylooligosaccharides (XOS) are oligomers of xylose with interesting functional properties that can be produced from biomass, and are an interesting bioproduct to compose the portfolio of biorefineries. In this sense, understanding and mitigating the environmental impacts of its production becomes imperative. In this context, the present work carried out the environmental analysis of XOS production integrated into a sugarcane biorefinery using the methodology of life cycle analysis (LCA) seeking to identify the most appropriate biomass pretreatment from the environmental point of view. Initially, a survey and analysis of data from the literature was carried out with the help of the Microsoft Power BI software in order to identify factors that influence the production of XOS. Then, simulations were performed in EMSO (Environment for Modeling, Simulation and Optimization) software and LCAs of XOS production using hydrothermal or organossolve pretreatments considering two methodologies (ReCiPe with midpoint approach and CML-IA with baseline world 2000 approach). In order to define the ideal method for this study, a comparison was made between the categories of similar environmental impacts of the CML and ReCiPe methods. The pre-treatment and hydrolysis stages were the stages that contributed the most to the emissions of environmental impacts. The integration of the XOS process into a sugarcane biorefinery can significantly reduce the environmental impact of the process, since the plant's energy demand (thermal and electrical energy) is produced internally from by-products of the process. Finally, among the pre-treatments studied, the hydrothermal pre-treatment proved to be interesting from the environmental point of view for the production of XOS integrated to biorefineries, presenting emissions up to 48% lower than the Organossolve (0.19 and 0.15 gCO2 in the CML method and 0.15 and 0.12 gCO2 in the ReCiPe method), future works include deepening from the economic point of view, comparative analysis between the CML and ReCiPe methods in environmental analyses of integrated biorefinery and XOS production considering the stages of purification of XOS syrup and subsequent environmental and economic analysis of the process.