Socioeconomic analysis of bioproducts derived from babassu nut breakers pyrolysis in legal amazonia communities

Abstract

Lignocellulosic biomass residues can generate interesting materials for the chemical and food industries. Physical activation processes were developed by cold pressing and slow pyrolysis, as well as physical chemical activation with zinc chloride (ZnCl₂), to produce bio-based products, including bio-oil (30%) and biochar (31%), with good yields. Charcoal and biooil provided good results, respectively, with regard to adsorption capacity (357 m² g^-1 of surface area BET) and the possibility of extracting chemical compounds (phenols with 45.81% and aldehydes with 32.76%). Moreover, the key economic performance indicators of the process were analyzed, and the results indicate that the proposed process is economically feasible and attractive with $422,416.10 profits. Finally, after dialoguing with the babassu nut breakers and understanding their needs, the feasibility of economically developing the contacted families through technology transfer for extracting the oil, cake, biochar, and bio-oil from babassu coconuts was studied, demonstrating the possibility of income generation based on the profitability achieved in this study.

Keywords:
lignocellulosic biomass; bio-oil; biochar; energy