Investigation of Sargassum-Based Bioethanol Blends as a Sustainable Alternative Fuel

This project seeks to contribute to the global cardon emissions reduction agenda through the use of alternative sources of fuel that do not produce carbon emissions. In other words, this approach is known as “CO2 avoidance” through the use of carbon-neutral fuels. The production of biofuel, namely bioethanol using edible feedstock has raised serious humanity concerns along the lines of the issue of malnutrition and hunger prevalent in our day. This has shifted the focus to using non-edible feedstock such as sea-weed (Sargassum) to produce bioethanol and its blends. Sea weeds offers an excellent alternative to displace fossil fuels and from an ecological point of view, sea weeds aid in reducing the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and supplying oxygen :to the sea. For this reason, sea weed has been proposed as a promising biomass material that can be easily converted to bioethanol based on its low lignin (an unwanted material in the biomass to ethanol conversion process) content.

Faculty Supervisor:

Raphael Idem

Student:

Partner:

University of Mines and Technology

Discipline:

Engineering

Sector:

Clean Technology; Sustainability & the Environment

University:

University of Regina

Program: