Fractionation of Cellulose-Rich Products from an Empty Fruit Bunch (EFB) by Means of Steam Explosion Followed by Organosolv Treatment
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper is devoted to problem of utilization of EFB, large-scale waste of the palm oil production, by the steam-explosion method.
Several remarks are appeared when reading the manuscript.
The title includes “sell wall” words, but they are not used neither in the Experimental nor in the Results, Discussion and Conclusion. Hence, they may be deleted from the Title. Steam explosion of plant resourses is known during several decades , and therefore the industrial applicability, successes, and prospects of this method may be discuss [Brownell H.H., Yu Ekc, Saddler J.N. Steam-explosion pretreatment of wood - effect of chip size, acid, moisture-content and pressure-drop. Biotechnology and Bioengineering, 1986, v. 28, Iss. 6, p. 792-801]. The author should compare their results and literature data on steam explosion of other plant wastes, and emphasize a scientific novelty of their results.
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
The formats of references, both in texts and reference listing, are inconsistent, and it is difficult to locate when they are mentioned in the texts. Figure 1, what is the correct temperature for ACSE treatment? It is listed 220 degree C in the figure, but 200 degree C in Line 97. In regular steam explosion treatment, residence times of only 5, 10, and 15 mins are used. What is the reason to use 20 mins as the residence time in ACSE treatment? Please rationale. Please indicate the percentage basis for Figure 2, Table 2, Figure 3 and Table 3. Without knowing the comparing basis, it is hard to tell which condition is better. Please provide the detail data of E-L, EA-L, E-S-OL and EA-S-OL. The authors mentioned a few of them suddenly in the texts, where only the holocellulose and lignin % of E-S, E-S-CS, EA-S, and EA-S-CS were presented in Table 2 and Table 3. There is no way to deduct the data of E-L, EA-L, E-S-OL and EA-S-OL from Table 2 and Table 3. For example, discussion in Line 151, Line 180-182 and Line 184. There are huge differences of the total sugar content in EA-S-CS (0.5%, 1.0% and 2%, in Table 4) compared to that presented in the holocellulose % in Table 3. Please check the mass balances. There is essentially no discussion of Table 5 in the text. For the XRD, please give a table to present the calculated % crystallinity data rather than just present the raw XRD figure in Figure 4. Table 6, are these data from E-S-OL or EA-S-OL, please specify. The name of guaiacol, syringol and isoeugenol, please be consistent in texts and in Table 6.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Dear Authors,
I believe that the industrial applicability and prospects of the steam explosion method should be discuss in the Introduction, and I recommended to do it in my first message.
Sincerely.
Reviewer.
Author Response
Dear sir,
as you mentioned the industrial applicability and prospects of stream explosion were briefly described in the introduction part according to the references.
The revised manuscript was also uploaded.
Thanks a lot,
Joon
