PRODUCTION OF BIOETHANOL FROM RICE STRAW

INTRODUCTION

Rice is the world's third-largest cereal crop after maize (corn) and wheat. It is a main

staple food supplying more than half of the world's population with energy and protein. In July

2017, a record 686.4 million tons of rice was produced in Asia with India as the second-largest

producer after China. Malaysia also one of the largest productions of rice which is 3.1 million

tons per year [1]. Most of the paddy fields in Malaysia are wetland paddy. Only a few is dryland

paddy. Paddy lands are mainly located in Kedah, Perak, Kelantan and Perlis states.

Table 1: Major Rice-Producing Continent/Countries in The World

 The amount of harvest seasons in Malaysia ranges from 1 to 2 per year. When cereal

crops are harvested, it is estimated that half of the process ends with agricultural waste or crop

residue as rice straw. It is an inedible product that is often left on the ground after harvesting.

Figure 1: Paddy - Rice Flow Chart in Malaysia

Rice straw is one of the agricultural waste products and an abundance of lignocellulosic

substances induced by rice cultivation. Rice straw has several features that make it a potential

feedstock for the manufacturing of bioethanol. It is recalcitrant in nature and its cell wall has

been developed to tackle several growing needs, including protection from harsh

environmental circumstances, insects and pathogens. It has high cellulose and hemicelluloses

content that can be readily hydrolyzed into fermentable sugars. In terms of chemical

composition rice straw predominantly contains cellulose 32-47%, hemicelluloses 19-27%,

lignin 5-24% and ash 18.8%. The carbohydrates of rice straw include glucose 34-43.4%, xylose

19.0-22.0%, arabinose 2.0-3.6%, mannose 1.8% and galactose 0.4% [2].

 Technologies have been created on two platforms to convert this feedstock to ethanol,

which can be called the platform for sugar and synthesis gas (or syngas). These platforms

fundamental steps are shown in Figure 2. Cellulose and hemicellulose are first transformed into

fermentable sugars on the sugar platform, which are then fermented to create ethanol. The

fermentable sugars include glucose, xylose, arabinose, galactose, and mannose. Hydrolysis of

cellulose and hemicellulose can be performed using either acids or enzymes to generate these

sugars. The biomass is subjected to a process called gasification in the syngas platform. In this

process, the biomass is heated with no oxygen or only about one-third the oxygen normally

required for complete combustion. It then converts into a gaseous product containing mostly

carbon monoxide and hydrogen. The gas, which is called synthesis gas or syngas, can be

fermented by specific microorganisms or converted catalytically to ethanol. In the sugar

platform, only the carbohydrate fractions are utilized for ethanol production, whereas in the

syngas platform, all three components of the biomass are converted to ethanol [3].

Figure 2: Basic Concept of Ethanol Production from Rice Straw

CURRENT STATUS

Currently, the status of ethanol manufacturing from rice straw in Malaysia is only at

the academic level. There is no commercial or small-scale enterprise that produces ethanol

from rice straw in Malaysia at the moment. The journal “Techno-economic analysis of

bioethanol production from rice straw by liquid-state fermentation” [3] described multiple case

studies were acquired in order to provide insight into the process involved and its implications

for production and to obtain bioethanol. There are three main components of the bioethanol

production which are the collection, logistics, and pretreatment of rice straw. The theoretical

bioethanol yield and conversion efficiency obtained were 250 L/t and 60% respectively.

The findings concluded that rice straw bioethanol production is currently not

economically feasible on the market in Malaysia due to lack of pretreatment efficiency and

overbearing cost of logistics and pretreatment. This work could serve as a reference in Malaysia

for future biofuel marketing studies. The major cost of the process comes from logistics is

demonstrated in Table 2.

Table 2: Cost distribution of bioethanol production

On the other hand, the journal “Production of Bioethanol from Rice Straw using

Cellulase by Local Aspergillus sp.” [4] explain in this study, cellulase enzyme was produced
from rice straw by locally isolated Aspergillus sp. in solid state fermentation. The rice straw

was previously saccharified using the crude cellulase generated by a few cycles of wet disc

milling. The saccharification produced more than 90% of glucose from total cellulose. The

saccharified product was subjected to fermentation by yeast. The highest bioethanol yield

produced from the fermentation was 0.102 g g-1 rice straw which is equivalent to 62.61% of

theoretical bioethanol yield. It was concluded that the use of crude cellulase from rice straw

onto rice straw can lead to a good yield of bioethanol, provided an effective pretreatment was

used.

Table 3: Percentage of ethanol yield over total potential sugar from rice straw with different

treatment
CHALLENGES

1. Country is Still Depending on Coal Power and Hydroelectricity Dams

The nation still relies highly on coal power stations or large hydroelectricity dams [5]. Coal

plays a large role in Malaysia’s energy scheme and is fully imported. Some 63%, is imported

from Indonesia, with another 24% coming from Australia and the remainder from nations as

far away as Russia (11%) and South Africa (2%). Peninsular Malaysia’s power generation is

highly dependent on fossil fuel with 53% coal, 42% natural gas and 5% hydro, together with

other forms of renewable energy (RE). The total installed generation capacity in the country at

the end of 2011 was 28433 MW with a plant mix of 51.58% gas turbine and combined cycle,

27.01% coal, 10.60% hydro, 5.28% diesel, 2.85 % oil/gas thermal and the remaining others

such as biomass and co-generation.

Hydropower has a number of benefits. Once a dam has been built and the equipment

installed, the energy source—flowing water—is free. It is a safe source of energy renewed by

rainfall and snow. Hydropower plants can supply large amounts of electricity, and they are

relatively easy to adjust for demand by controlling the flow of water through the turbines.

Table 4: Installed Capacity and Power Generation in Malaysia According to Fuel Type
 In order to turn the energy sphere into a cleaner, sustainable and effective stage, the long-

term domestic development plans must be included. At the moment, the investors are less

optimistic to the RE sector due to lack of economies of scale. Although pioneer status and

investment tax allowances are given to the investors, the incentives do not attract more players

to join the industry. In other words, a more extensive approach to help start-up biofuel crops,

including facilitated bank loans, should be correctly identified [5].

2. Community

Based on interview that has been made, community support is very important in increasing

and continuing the demands from the rice straw products. Somehow there is lack of awareness

and sensitivity of community to the environmentally-friendly products. The potential and

advantages of using rice straw are not being effectively explained to the consumer or

community. This lack of awareness is the weakness of institutional promotion. Institutions

should play a crucial role in enforced policies, improving technology, generating investment,

erecting infrastructure, promoting and marketing the product. Government policies should

change the existing rules and regulation in different institutional environment to encourage

development of entrepreneurship regarding the important of rice straw.

That poor support services from government institution or appropriate authorities is the key

point regarding stagnation in rice straw agribusiness and this is strongly agreed by most of

entrepreneur in Malaysia. Institution have currently seen the development of rice straw as a

small effort to reduce open burning, air pollution and reduce the cost of field management but

somehow if they are taking this issues as a big and important issues, we definitely can have a

lots of advantages and can reduce so much more issues regarding environment issue. There is

only indirectly policy in straw management and utilization because they focus more in main

agriculture by-product policy comes from oil and rubber. Therefore, only small amount of
institutions that support the development of the rice straw in Malaysia. In addition, poorly

trained officers are rarely guide entrepreneurs to improve product quality and weak promotion

from institution that makes the lack of awareness among community itself.

So that, when there is no awareness among community, most farmers do not know the

potential and advantages of using straw rice as feedstock. For example, many farmers still burn

their rice straws openly or just throw away the straw instead using it as a feedstock to produce

bioethanol. In addition, if the farmers know the right way to supply the rice straw, they will

gain such a good side income other than paddy. The entrepreneur also does not know how to

get the supply if there is no way or information on how to get the supply. Entrepreneur strongly

agree that the straw only attract urban communities instead of rural communities because they

assume that the rice straw is not unique and cannot do anything with it. However, rice straw

can be a high demand feedstock if they know how to use rice straw as a feedstock in order to

produce bioethanol or else. Therefore, it is not surprising if rice straw will be the highest

demand n favorable market overseas than locally if they awareness the usefulness of rice straw

in the industry.

According to the National Green Technology Policy Malaysia, effective promotion and

public awareness are two of the main factors that would affect the success of sustainable

development through the Green Technology agenda. This is particularly significant as such

adoption requires a change of mindset of the public through various approaches, including

effective education and information dissemination to increase public awareness of sustainable

agriculture and on ways to conserve the environment. Mustafa and Mohd Jani (1995) also state

that greater public awareness about the environmental pollution and depletion of resource can

help Malaysia to develop sustainable agriculture. More intensive monitoring and investigating

agricultural practices would enable Malaysia to achieve sustainability.

As a solution, increasing awareness regarding sustainable agricultural practices and persuasive

technology is a viable alternative.

Information can be obtained from various media. In this era, a lot of media can be access

such as radio, internet, television and etc. Government should enhance more on this medium

to spread awareness among the community especially in a rural community. Organize an event

to all the entrepreneurs and farmers to encourage them to start this industry by sharing all the

information and supply needs to them.

3. Transportation

Rice is cultivated throughout Malaysia and covers about 600,000 ha of area under

cultivation. Twi-third of this area is located in Peninsular Malaysia, half of which falls under

eight major irrigation schemes. Most of the cope is located at the rural area which is has good

condition of soil and wide area because it needs a lot of space to plant. The copes are mostly

far away from the industry. Rice straw is collected using a baler machines and farm transporting

vehicles, such as tractors, power tillers and trucks. At the time harvest straw normally consists

of high moisture content (60%-70%) on the weight basis. Straw harvest, collection and

transportation play a major concern in bioethanol production. If the bioethanol industry is

located at the corner of the circle, the relationship between distance and annual feedstock

demand by an ethanol plant can be calculated as follows.

 Figure 3: Relationship Between Distance And Annual Feedstock Demand By An Ethanol

The straw has low bulk density and transporting large volumes of straw is a major cost.

The abrasive nature of straw contains higher wear and maintenance for processing equipment,

resulting in high processing cost. Lack of proper straw harvesting technology, machinery for

straw collection and higher transportation cost encourage the farmers to burn straw at the field

without doing any further process. The transportation cost and infrastructural settings can affect

the bioethanol production that ultimately lead to climate change. The exploitation of straw for

bioethanol generation emits fewer amount of GHG and also lignin, unreacted carbohydrates

and other organic product during the process. These unreacted by-product (lignin, residual

carbohydrates and organic products) are used as energy sources for distillation of ethanol and

electricity generation.

In order to reduce the cost, the straw should be allowed to dry to bring down the moisture

content to 25% by natural drying. The responsible institution also needs to provide any form

of aid such as money or information in order to provide the farmers a better machinery and

transportation to collect, process and transport the rice straw to the industry. Finally, the
bioethanol industry also should be located at the nearest crops to avoid any extra costing in

transportation issue [7].

4. Geology

Malaysia has a humid, tropical climate that is influenced by complex land-sea interactions

and mountainous topography. Due to an increase in tropical storms in South China, both East

and West Malaysia have been experiencing more extreme events of rainfall and gusting. The

regional climatic trends in Malaysia are in accord with the increase in average surface

temperature and large variation in rainfall trends. A higher regional temperature increase is

indicated for the western region of Malaysia than for the eastern region. However, the

frequency of relatively drier years has increased for the whole of Malaysia. Of the two major

rice-cropping seasons, the main season corresponds with the wetter, northeast monsoon, and

the off season corresponds with the dry period before the beginning of the southwest monsoon.

Generally, rice planting for the main season is from September to December, and for the off

season from February to May which is the season is quite limited for collect the rice straw for

the production.

Meanwhile, the size of paddy land in Peninsular Malaysia whether according to the states

or granary areas for the past 15 years has shown a diminishing pattern. The reduction continues

to happen every year. Analysis according to states has found that Pahang is the highest

contributor in terms of the reduction of paddy land that is 21,449 hectares. In 1997, Pahang has

29,497 hectares of paddy land. It is the fourth-ranked state with highest paddy land areas after

Kedah, Kelantan and Perak. This means that Pahang has lost its paddy land size by 72.71%

from 1997 to 2011. However, according to percentage, it found that Negeri Sembilan has the

higher percentage compared to Pahang that is 78.04%. The difference is that Negeri Sembilan
has a smaller paddy land area that is from 9,793 hectares to 2,150 hectares. It is the smallest

area after Johor and Melaka.

Figure 4: Granary Areas in Peninsular Malaysia

To ensure the level of self-sustained rice and the supply of rice straw, the Government

has identified 8 granary areas in Peninsular Malaysia. They are MADA, KADA, IADA KSM,

IADA BLS, IADA Penang, IADA Seberang Perak, IADA KETARA and IADA Kemasik

Semerak. Even for these areas, the land use change activities for the purpose of nonagricultural

development or non-paddy agriculture are inevitable. From the perspective of the size of the
diminished paddy land, IADA Kemasin Semerak granary area with the highest rate of loss.

Almost half of the area has experienced land use change that is a reduction of 5,613 hectares

or 52.65% of its total size. This is followed by IADA KSM with 3,270 hectares or 10.90%, and

so on KADA with 1,990 hectares or 6.32% from its total area.

Figure 5: The trend of paddy land lost in Malaysia according to States and Granary Areas

(1997-2011)

In contrast, from the perspective of the size of the states that were experiencing the loss

of size of the paddy land, there were two areas with increasing size of land losses. The two

areas were IADA Barat Laut Selangor (BLS) and IADA Penang which recorded an increase of

831 hectares (4.56%) and 364 hectares (3.66%) respectively. Although the size increase of the

land lost is not compatible with the total diminished land in other areas, at least it has replaced

part of the land that was lost. Overall, the loss of paddy land in Peninsular Malaysia according
to the States and granary areas was 1.47% and 0.34% respectively. This indicates that paddy

land control according to granary areas is better compared to states and all the rice straw can

be collect and have enough supply for the product.

5. Environmental

When we are dealing with a mass production in chemical industry, there are always

challenges faced especially related to the environment. The production of the side products

from the chemical processes can have many negative side effects to the environment.

Therefore, in the production of bioethanol from rice straw in Malaysia, there are a few

challenges faced related to the environment. Several technologies will be assembled based on

their impact on the environment. The environmental impacts can primarily be allocated to three

classifications of effect: fossil fuel use, respiratory effects, and carcinogenics (37.0 %, 25.4 %,

and 17.3 %, respectively, of all environmental impacts). The corresponding fractions of the

other types of effect do not exceed 10%. The environmental effects are dominated by three

procedures: straw supply, HCl supply, and process heat supply. The supply of hydrochloric

acid accounts for more than 65 % of the environmental effects for all effect classifications

except for carcinogenics and land occupation. Another significant method is straw supply

(78.4% carcinogenics, 88.2% land use). Process thermal supply accounts for 19.5% and 25.3%

of effects in climate change and fossil energy usage categories, respectively [11].

The environmental impact of straw supply is due to (a) the production of straw itself

and (b) the transport to the biorefinery. Transportation contributes 13–34 % to the

environmental effects of straw supply for all effect categories, with the exception of climate

change, carcinogenics, and land occupation where the corresponding proportion is only 1 % to

the maximum. Since straw supply only plays a major part in carcinogenics and land occupation,
it can be said that although transport distances are presumed to be large, the transportation

method does not play an important part in the environmental effects.

Figure 6: Environmental Impact Category

The process of harvesting and grinding of biomass feedstock can produce amount of

particulate that can affected the air quality surrounding if it is not handled properly. The dry

residue produced by the rice paddy is around 192.82 Mt/yr [12]. This amount of particulate

emitted during the processes can be harmful to the environment. The specific equipment

needed to be installed to the biofuel chemical plant in order to reduce the amount of particulate

emitted to the surrounding and keeping the surrounding air and environment safe. The extra

equipment installed will cost more to the producer and will give fewer profits.
Figure 7: Annual Production
FUTURE DIRECTION

Biorefinery is still new in Malaysia and this technology is still under research.

Therefore, the application of biorefinery is still rare and not popular in this country yet.

Development of lignocellulosic biorefineries – with mature bioenergy, biogas and biofuels

technologies; development of platform or intermediate goods, such as syngas and bio-oil; and

development of RRfW systems, Reduction of carbon dioxide (CDR) and capture and reuse of

carbon (CCR) to create chemical substances, biofuels, equipment, etc. These technologies

across the technology readiness level (TRL) are illustrated in figure below. [18]

Figure 3

High-efficiency biorefinery-integrated RRfW, CDR and CCR technologies are

beginning to be seen as an effective way to realize a circular green economy in Malaysia. The

development of the TRL results from an efficient commitment strategy by stakeholders through

a week-long workshop between UK and Malaysia on Researcher Links. The figure below

demonstrates the primary steps in the different stakeholders ' strategy and interactions.
 Figure 5

Also accountable for synthesizing workshop outputs was the core science and

management committee made up of experts in biorefinery design setup, synthesis, integration

and sustainability optimization that organized the fully financed workshop under Newton

financing. To synthesize the outputs, one of which is the work reported here, the committee

has fully involved with all participant stakeholders.

Early career scientists, 20 from each country, were provided fully financed locations on

a competitive basis using the format for the application for the Newton-funded Researcher

Links workshop, to present their research in the workshop and to add to the synthesis of outputs

in subsequent debates. The governance, NGOs and policy and decision makers in the area in

Malaysia were invited to give speeches and fully engaged after the workshop for revalidation

of the outputs synthesized. The output synthesis process has been iterative involving

stakeholders’ inputs throughout. The stakeholders that represented the workshop have been
research and business organizations in the UK and research, business, governmental, non-

governmental and funding organization in Malaysia.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, the production of bioethanol from rice straw has a bright future in this

country, Malaysia. The introduction of biorefineries technology is a real game changer that can

brings a lot of positive impacts to Malaysia. Biodiesel is proven to be a substitute to the fossil

fuel that is decreasing now. The usage of bioethanol as biodiesel can reduce the environmental

problems and can help to revise the destroyed environment. The biorefineries technology has

also become the new trend in other developed countries. Malaysia has many good resources

for biorefineries technology therefore we should not waste it.

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