Process Engineering

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Browsing Process Engineering by Subject "Agave sisal"

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    Production and Characterization of Pulp and Paper from Agave Sisal
    (Addis Ababa University, 2021-06) Yonas, Assefe; Nurelegne, Tefera (Ass. Prof)
    Paper is a thin sheet material made from cellulose fibers raw materials that is mechanically or chemically processed. Wood, non-wood, and non-plant (mainly wastepaper) fibers are the most common sources of cellulosic fiber used in pulp and paper production. For the production of pulp, paper, and soft boards, both wood and non-wood resources are currently used. The cellulose fiber comes from non-wood materials, such as bagasse, corn straw, bamboo, reed, grass, jute, flax, Agave Sisal, and so on. Agave Sisal is a lignocellulose plant which is found in America, Africa, and Asia. Before flowering, a sisal plant produces 200-250 leaves, each with 700-1400 fiber bundles measuring 0.5-1.0 m in length. This study also investigated the proximate analysis, chemical compositions, and morphological properties of agave sisal fibers. The sisal fiber Proximate analysis and Chemical compositions constitutes of 88.62% hemicellulose, 68.5% cellulose, 20.12% hemicellulose, 8.5% lignin, 1.74% extractive, 1.14% ash and 22% moisture content. Agave sisal's morphological properties included fiber length, diameter, lumen width, and cell wall thickness, which were 2.86mm, 24.49m, 28.92m, and 8.30m, respectively. Agave sisal has an acceptable Runkel ratio (0.57), slenderness ratio (116.78) and flexibility coefficient (118.09) in the range of non-woods. Pulp production from agave sisal, including various pulping conditions, including the composition of cooking liquor (10, 15 and 20%) and cooking temperature (130, 140 and 150 ˚C) at reaction times (60, 90 and 120 min) were studied using a full factorial experimental design and to determine the good pulping conditions. The effect of pulping conditions on pulp yield and Kappa number was studied. The optimum pulping conditions were obtained by using a full factorial experimental design with three main factors at three levels. The results showed that active alkali, cooking time, and cooking temperature all had a significant effect on pulp yield and Kappa number. At the optimal pulping conditions of 20% active alkali and 140˚C for 120 minutes, a pulp yield of 42.37 percent was obtained with a kappa number of 4.53. The agave sisal pulp was prepared, bleached, and paper hand sheets of 60 g/m2 were made under optimal conditions and strength properties were tested. Breaking length (5185.18 m), tensile strength (6.18 kN/m), tensile index (81.31 Nm/g), tear strength (139.34 mN), tear index (17.97 mN.m2/g), and burst index (4.81 kPa.m2/g) were all measured. The tested strength properties were nearly identical to those of other non-wood papermaking fiber resources. Overall, chemical and morphological analysis showed that agave sisal fibers are a promising fibrous raw material for paper production.