PENGARUH JENIS DAN KONSENTRASI KATALISATOR ASAM TERHADAP SINTESIS FURFURAL DARI SEKAM PADI

Indonesia is an agrarian country with a large rice production, where rice production is often high, the potential of rice waste will be higher, one of the waste is rice hull that can be used as raw material for the manufacture of furfural. This research aims to determine the type and concentration of acid catalyst in the manufacture of furfural, and analyze the effect of acid catalyst type and concentration to furfural obtained. This research was done by three stages, namely preparation of raw materials, hydrolysis and distillation process. Preparation of raw materials was started by reducing the rice hull's size up to 80 mesh and then drying. Acid catalyst hydrolysis carried out for four hours with the operating temperature of 85 oC, then filtered hydrolyzate was purified by distillation. Research was done by varying the acid catalyst in the form of sulfuric acid and hidrochloric acid with the concentration of 1%, 3%, 5%, 7% and 9%. The results showed that the synthesis of furfural from rice hull obtained the highest furfural concentration on the sulfuric acidcatalyst at 1% concentration. The furfural obtained with concentration of 1%, 3%, 5%, 7% and 9% on a sulfuric acidcatalyst respectively at 1.815%; 1.256%; 0.933%; 0.733% and 0.730%, while the furfural obtained on the hydrochloric acid catalyst respectively at 1.659%; 1.126%; 0.848%; 0.737% and 0.726%.