Enhancing Ethanol Production by Fermentation Using Saccharomyces cereviseae under Vacuum Condition in Batch Operation

Ethanol is one of renewable energy, which considered being an excellent alternative clean-burning fuel to replaced gasoline. In fact, the application of ethanol as fuel still blended with gasoline. The advantages of using ethanol as fuel are that the raw material mostly from renewable resources and the product has low emission which means environmental friendly. Ethanol can be produced by fermentation of sugars (glucose/fructose). The constraint in the ethanol fermentation batch or continuous process is the ethanol product inhibition. Inhibition in ethanol productivity and cell growth can be overcome by taking the product continuously from the fermentor. The process can be done by using a vacuum fermentation. The objective of this research is to investigate the effect of pressure and glucose concentration in ethanol fermentation. The research was conducted in laboratory scale and batch process. Equipment consists of fermentor with vacuum system. The observed responses were dried cells of yeast, concentration of glucose, and concentration of ethanol. Observations were made every 4 hours during a day of experiment. The results show that the formation of ethanol has a growth-associated product characteristic under vacuum operation. Vacuum condition can increase the cell formation productivity and the ethanol formation, as it is compared with fermentation under atmospheric condition. The maximum cells productivity and ethanol formation in batch operation under vacuum condition was reached at 166.6 mmHg of pressure. The maximum numbers of cells and ethanol formation was reached at 141.2 mm Hg of pressure. High initial glucose concentration significantly can affect the productivity and the yield of ethanol.