Actual and putative potentials of macauba palm as feedstock for solid biofuel production from residues

Abstract

The making of biofuel from source that aggregates multiple suitable raw materials is of great interest. An example of such source is macauba palm. Its fruit satisfies the demands for biodiesel production, and the solid residues resulting from its processing contain a series of potential fuel byproducts. Thus, our objective was to evaluate macauba fruit yield and the potential of this fruit to produce for solid biofuel. For this, the palm's productivity was assessed in a natural population, and two different scenarios of fruit yield and derived residues were analyzed: in scenario 1, the fruit yield average values were used without a priori information, while in scenario 2, the top 10% of plants in terms of number of bunch per plant were considered. Harvested fruits were quantified and processed. Solid residues had their chemical and physical characteristics determined. The fruit yield in scenario 2 was 98% higher than that in scenario 1, which did not exceed 2.32 Gg km−2 y−1 fresh fruit. Regarding residue characterization, the endocarp showed higher values of fixed carbon, lignin, bulk density and energy density than the other residues. The overall primary energies of the residues were 23.35 TJ km−2 y−1 and 44.39 TJ km−2 y−1 in scenarios 1 and 2, respectively. These findings indicate that macauba fruit is a promising source of primary and residual raw materials for biofuel production. Satisfactory production scale would be from a breeding program to maximize the fruit production of the plants, as mimicked by scenario 2.