Electroporation-Assisted Dewatering as an Alternative Method for Drying Plants

During the last few years, electroporation has been introduced to the food-processing industry as an effective method to open cell membranes for the extraction of substances. Currently, it has been investigated whether electroporation is also useful as a part of an energy-efficient drying process for plant material for the production of biofuel. To omit the use of additional water, the material has been placed in contact with the electrodes by means of its own juice after a first pressing step. This paper describes a laboratory-scale parameter study on the electroporation-assisted drying of whole maize plants, grass, and lucerne. The influence of the applied electric-field strength and the number of applied pulses on the drying curves is presented. For the electroporated material, an increased yield of juice during a pressing step after the electroporation and a faster drying have been observed.