Influence of NaOH concentration, refining stage and pulping temperature on cold soda pulping of Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunch (OPEFB)
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Date
2014-08
Authors
Abdul Wahid, Khadijah
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Abstract
There is a wide range of products made from tissue paper, including toilet
paper, kitchen towels, handkerchiefs, facial tissues, serviette (table napkin),
products for industrial use, etc, of which serviette is the subject of investigation in
this project. This investigation highlights the use of waste biomass from the oil palm
empty fruit bunch (OPEFB) as alternative raw material for the production of
serviette. In an effort to be more environmentally friendly, the OPEFB pulp is
produced via the chemi-mechanical process (cold soda pulping) using sodium
hydroxide (NaOH) as the pretreatment chemical followed by refining. The NaOH
dosage used was varied from 0%, 1%, 3%, 5%, 7% to 10%. The mechanical
properties such as tensile strength, bursting strength and tearing strength showed a
significant changes with the addition of NaOH. The optical properties do not have
any significant changes when both the NaOH concentration and refining process
was increased. Pulping temperature has a negative effect on tensile strength but a
positive one with tear strength; it also has a strong influence in Kappa number
where it decreases with decrease in temperature. In addition to the pulping
parameters, a comparison was made on the strength properties of two commercially
available serviettes with papers from OPEFB pulp. It is found that the OPEFB fibers
can produce good quality pulps that can be used in serviette making. Based on these
findings it can be concluded that cold soda pulping can be an efficient process to
produce pulps from OPEFB for the manufacturing of serviettes.
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Keywords
Oil Palm