Fuel Ethanol Production from Carob Pod

There is a growing interest worldwide to find out new and cheap carbohydrate sources for production of bioethanol. In this work, carob pod (Ceratonia Siliqua) is proposed as an economical source for ethanol production, especially, in arid regions. The carob tree is an evergreen shrub native to the Mediterranean region, cultivated for its edible seed pods and it is currently being reemphasised as an alternative in dryland areas, because no carbon-enriched lands are necessary. The global process of bioethanol production from carob pod by Saccharomyces Cerevisiae yeast cells was analyzed. In a first stage, the aqueous extraction of sugars from the pod was conducted, achieving almost complete extraction of sugars (>99 %) in a short period of time. After that, fermentation of hydrolysates were carried out at 30oC, 125 rpm, 200 g/L of sugars and 15 g/L of Saccharomyces Cerevisiae yeast cells. In these conditions, a maximum of 95 g/L of ethanol was obtained after 24 h.