BIOETHANOL PRODUCTION VIA SYNGAS FERMENTATION OF CLOSTRIDIUM LJUNGDAHLII IN A HOLLOW FIBER MEMBRANE SUPPORTED BIOREACTOR

The production of ethanol via syngas fermentation obtained from lignocellulose gasification provides a method for completely utilizing all of the carbon content from lignocellulosic feedstock. The low mass transfer rate of less soluble CO and H-2 gas to liquid has been considered a major bottleneck in the overall process; however, microporous membrane has been proposed as a gas diffuser to improve gas-to-liquid mass transfer. In this study, a liquid batch of syngas fermentation employing Clostridium ljungdahlii with continuous gas supply was obtained using the configuration of a bioreactor connected to microporous hydrophobic polypropylene hollow fiber membrane (HFM) as a gas diffuser. Liquid recirculation between the fermentation vessel and membrane module was applied to enhance the gas-liquid contact as well as cell-recycle. The fermentation performance with and without HFM was compared and evaluated by cell growth, CO utilization, ethanol yield, and productivity. A higher ethanol yield, 0.22 mol/mol, was achieved using the system of an HFM-supported bioreactor with a higher ethanol titer of 1.09 g/L and an ethanol-acetate molar ratio of 1.43 mol/mol. The obtained result demonstrates that an HFM-supported bioreactor is the best fermentation system compared to stirred tank reactor (STR) without a membrane.