Dr. Rafael Souza, PhD

The programme develops a pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis sequence for sugarcane bagasse, evaluated under the compositional variability characteristic of field-collected rather than laboratory-standardised feedstock, with integrated process economics.

Laboratory conversion processes for lignocellulosic residue routinely report yields obtained on standardised feedstock. Field-collected material varies substantially in composition, and reported yields degrade accordingly. Process economics are rarely published, making commercial viability difficult to assess independently.

Process development across 23 pretreatment variants, evaluated on feedstock sampled from eleven cooperatives across two harvest seasons to capture compositional variability, with techno-economic analysis integrated at each development stage.

The developed sequence achieved 78 percent theoretical conversion across the observed variability range, against 81 percent on standardised feedstock — a substantially smaller degradation than comparable processes. Techno-economic analysis indicated viability at prevailing feedstock prices provided transport distance remained under 60 kilometres.

The work delivers a conversion process validated under realistic variability, with published economics enabling independent assessment.