Influence of Sulphuric Acid Concentration on the Physico-Chemical Properties of Microfibrillated Cellulose From Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunch Fibre

Abstract

The interest for microfibrillated cellulose (MFC) has been present within the academic sector since the 1980s, but recently this material has become commercially available as it is growing significantly in the industrial sector. Therefore, in this study the oil palm empty fruit bunch fibre was selected to be synthesised into MFC. This study focused on the effect of acid concentrations on the isolation of MFC from oil palm empty fruit bunch fibre (OPEFB-fibre) using the acid hydrolysis method, followed by ultrasonication. The important parameter studied was the concentration of sulphuric acid (10% to 40%) while reaction time and temperature were kept constant. The resulting MFC was analysed using fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), x-ray diffractometer (XRD) and scanning electron microscope (SEM). Based on the FTIR results, it was found that the structure of cellulose was retained after undergoing the acid hydrolysis process. The highest thermal stability was obtained when MFC was treated with 20% H 2 SO 4 which was determined by using TGA. The XRD method was used to study the structural property of the MFC and the result showed that the MFC produced had 60% of crystallinity index. The morphological features were identified using SEM. The results showed that the particle size of MFC ranged between 10 µm to 200 µm. As a result, the parameters used tend to influence the physico-chemical properties of MFC produced and it has the potential to facilitate filler increase in wood free papers industry.

Morphology and Dispersion Stability of Nanocellulose Extracted from Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunch Fibre by High-Pressure Homogenization

“…The morphology of MCC showed that the diameter size of MCC decreased along with the length of the fibres as the concentration of sulphuric acid rose. Before treatment, OPEFBs' raw fibres are composed up of bundles bound together by lignin and hemicellulose, and their surface morphology is uneven and rough [21]. Due to the depolymerization of cellulose polymers, a shorter chained MCC was produced, which had a different structure from that of cellulose [22].…”

Application of cellulosic fiber in soil erosion mitigation: Prospect and challenges

“…Many studies have been conducted to sustainably utilize biomass wastes from the oil palm industry. Among these studies, the use of OPEFB in the pulp and paper industry to replace the existing paper from wood sources was explored (Ibrahim 2003;Tanaka et al 2004).…”

Real-time oil palm ripeness classification of fresh fruit bunches using fluorescence technology

“…Near infrared spectrometry (NIRS) is one of the nondestructive methods (Ismail, 2010), consisting of light detection and ranging (LiDAR) scanning systems that have been studied to classify oil palm ripeness in the Malaysian oil palm industry, where the proposed approach was based on calculating the reflectance percentage using the concept of linearity (Zulkifli et al, 2018). Another application classified oil palm ripening into under-ripe, ripe and over-ripe categories using hand-held, multi-parameter fluorescence sensors and blue-green (447 nm) and far-red (685 nm) wavelengths.…”