Australian researchers develop low temp pretreatment for biomass feedstock

In Australia, researchers at Monash University have published in Nature’s Scientific Reports a one-step peracetic acid pretreatment of hardwood and softwood biomass for platform chemicals. The process achieved 90% delignification in five hours at 90 degrees centigrade. Typically pretreatments require high temperatures of above 150 degrees C but researchers the world over are focused on finding effective, efficient methods that can be done at lower temperatures in order to reduce the energy required for processing biomass feedstocks.