Cotton gin residue (CGR), a byproduct of the cotton ginning process, presents a major challenge for the cotton industry due to its abundant generation and difficult waste management. One of the solutions for navigating through this challenge could be valorization of cotton gin residues to produce biofuels and bioproducts, thus, being consistent with the circular economy and environmental preservation concepts. This study investigates the effect of ginning and cleaning methods on the sugar yields during enzymatic hydrolysis. The seed cotton gin byproduct samples, primarily composed of clean lint, hulls, motes, seeds, sticks, and dirt, were collected during three different ginning processes: saw, roller, and reciprocating. Two different byproduct samples were collected during the ginning process; one was collected during super jet cleaning, and the other was collected during the lint cleaning. Detailed chemical compositions of CGR samples were determined as per laboratory analysis protocol (LAP) from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Biomass were pretreated using dilute sulfuric acid. Untreated and Pretreated CGR will be hydrolyzed using commercial cellulase enzymes at 10% solids and 15 FPU/g biomass enzyme loading. The work is in progress, and the data will be analyzed to understand the variation in the sugar yields and cellulose conversion efficiency among various samples.
Keywords: Cotton gin, ginning, pretreatment, cellulose conversion.
