Study of liquefied empty fruit bunch oil as bio-based adhesive

The goal of this study is to investigate the feasibility of bio-oil from empty fruit bunches (EFB) as bio-based adhesive materials for bamboo plywood using thermochemical liquefaction technology. There have been a lot of studies on the application of bio-based adhesive in soft and hard plywood; however, there are limited of research on the comparability of EFB bio-based adhesive in the manufacturing of bamboo plywood. The experiment is conducted on a bench-scale where EFB was liquefied in the availability of phenol, using sulfuric acid as a catalyst at temperature 250 degrees C. Resinification is conducted under diverse working circumstances (temperature, time, and catalyst loading). The presence of common compounds found in commercial adhesives in considerable amounts in EFB bio-oil, such as aromatic hydrocarbon (22.78%), phenol (24.78%), and diethyl phthalate (17.67%), supports the implementation of EFB bio-oil as a bio-based adhesive. The effect of resinification reaction parameter (temperature, time, and catalyst loading) do not show much difference on the solid content and pH values; however, it shows great effect on the viscosity. The bonding strength results of the bamboo plywood shows optimal conditions for liquefaction were established at reaction temperature 85 degrees C, reaction time 1 h 30 min, and 0.5g of catalyst loading.