Tissue paper from corn stalk pulp in biorefinery concept

Corn stalk is employed as a raw material to produce tissue paper and glucose for biofuel. Corn stalk pulp has a high amount of fines which makes it a problematic material for paper making as well as tissue paper. In this study, pulp was produced from whole corn stalk by soda-anthraquinone process, which contained 32% fines, generated from the pith of the starting raw material. High fines content resulted the tissue paper to have low bulk, poor water absorbance, and swelling. The fines were separated from the pulp by fiber classifier. The fines-free pulp was used for tissue paper and fines were subjected to enzymatic hydrolysis using cellulase to produce glucose for bioethanol production. The bulk, water absorbency, and porosity of pulp sheets increased with the removal of fines from the whole pulp. One-stage enzymatic saccharification treatment using cellulase enzyme was evaluated for the conversion of cellulosic fines to monomeric sugars by varying treatment time, consistency, and pH. Maximum fines conversion was observed at a temperature of 40°C, 5.0 pH, and consistency of 6% for 6-h reaction. Efficacy of the cellulase activity was evaluated by measuring sugar yield and residual dry weight of fines.