Bioethanol production from tea fungal biomass grown on tea manufacture waste

Abstract

Tea fungus which is used to prepare Kombucha tea (KT) is a symbiotic growth of acetic acid bacteria and osmophilic yeast strains in a thick jelly membrane which has to be cultured in sugared tea. KT is composed of fermented tea broth and cellulosic pellicle layer. A portion of cellulosic pellicle layer tea fungus or kombucha) is used to start next batch of fermentation and the remaining portion is thrown as waste. Cellulose available in tea fungal biomass can be utilized as a substrate for bioethanol production. Tea waste material is the by-product produced during the process of black tea manufacture which will be dumped in tea industries as waste material. It has been suggested that tea waste material can be utilized as a substrate for the growth of tea fungus. The growth of tea fungus is influenced by concentration of sucrose, tea manufacture waste material and surface area to depth ratio of culture medium. It was experimentally found that 7% of sucrose and 1% of tea manufacture waste is having optimum yield of tea fungus growing in shallow container with a very wide opening. Extract of tea waste material can be utilized as an inexpensive substrate for bioethanol production from tea fungal biomass. Today, the economics are more favourable towards development of alternative fuel sources with particular reference to alcohols. Bioethanol is a suitable candidate which can be used as biodegradable fuel additive as ethanol/diesel blend to combat the global fuel crisis by replacing the fossil fuel based fuels.