Hydrothermal treatment and ethanol pulping of sunflower stalks

The influence of temperature in the hydrothermal treatment of sunflower stalks on the composition of the liquid fraction obtained was examined. The remaining solid fraction was subjected to ethanol pulping in order to obtain pulp that was used to produce paper sheets. The pulp was characterized in terms of yield, kappa index, viscosity, and cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin contents; and the paper sheets in terms of breaking length, stretch, burst index and tear index. Hydrothermal treatment of the raw material at 190 °C provided a liquid phase with maximal hemicellulose-derived oligomers and monosaccharide (glucose, xylose and arabinose) contents (26.9 and 4.2 g/L, respectively). Pulping the solid fraction obtained by hydrothermal treatment at 180 °C, with 70% ethanol at a liquid/solid ratio of 8:1 at 170 °C for 120 min provided pulp with properties on a par with those of soda pulp from the sunflower stalks, namely: 36.3% yield, 69.1% cellulose, 12.6% hemicellulose, 18.2% lignin and 551 ml/g viscosity. Also, paper sheets obtained from the ethanol pulp were similar in breaking length (3.8 km), stretch (1.23%), burst index (1.15 kN/g) and tear index (2.04 m Nm2/g) to those provided by soda pulp.