(534a) Plate Food Waste: A Valuable Source of Energy

Post-consumer food waste, because of its quantity and composition, could be a good feedstock for biofuel production.  The effect of glucan loading (2 and 6%), addition of an enzyme cocktail, pretreatment (grinding/drying or sterilizing), and food waste composition (breakfast vs. lunch, presence of used napkins) on ethanol concentration was reported.  The potential for sorting and converting used napkins into ethanol was also assessed.  At a 2% glucan content, ethanol concentration of up to 16 g/l was obtained after saccharification/fermentation of breakfast and lunch food waste.  Increasing glucan content to 6% significantly increased ethanol concentration to 54 g/L, while there was no significant effect of food waste composition on carbohydrate conversion efficiency.  When converting ethanol concentration from g/L to L/g of waste, concentrations of 0.06, 0.06 and 0.40 were obtained for food waste, food waste w/o napkins, and used napkins, respectively, identifying used napkins as an excellent source of bioethanol production.