IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/engenv/v36y2025i2p1038-1062.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Hydrothermal pretreatment with microwaves: A new strategy for ensuring the sustainability of biorefineries

Author

Listed:
  • Anusuiya Singh
  • Carolyn Palma Toloza
  • Reeta Rani Singhania
  • Andrea Carvajal Guevara

Abstract

Lignocellulosic biomass (LCB) includes agricultural residues, crop wastes, and food wastes that are ubiquitously present and can be used as renewable resources to generate bioenergy or biofuels. Still, direct utilization of LCB to produce biofuel is not an easy task due to the recalcitrance property of LCB. The pretreatment strategy is an important step in a biorefinery to reduce biomass recalcitrance and to use it for bioenergy including value-added product generation. Microwave irradiation is procuring interest regarding LCB and waste material pretreatment over time before moving to biological transformation to biofuels. The coupling of microwave heating with water has made it the most effective treatment for biomass valorization to generate biofuel and other value-added products, turning it into the most cost-effective and eco-friendly approach. Despite its numerous advantages, scaling up microwave pretreatment from laboratory experiments to industrial applications faces several challenges. These limitations become significant hurdles in scaling up. As a result, it is necessary to focus research on cost evaluations and life cycle assessment (LCA) studies for commercialization that will benefit the bioeconomy and the environment. This review discusses microwave-assisted pretreatment significance in valorizing LCB for biofuel generation including the cost evaluation and LCA studies that have the most important role in commercializing the microwave-assisted pretreatment from lab scale to industrial scale.

Suggested Citation

  • Anusuiya Singh & Carolyn Palma Toloza & Reeta Rani Singhania & Andrea Carvajal Guevara, 2025. "Hydrothermal pretreatment with microwaves: A new strategy for ensuring the sustainability of biorefineries," Energy & Environment, , vol. 36(2), pages 1038-1062, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:engenv:v:36:y:2025:i:2:p:1038-1062
    DOI: 10.1177/0958305X241291199
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0958305X241291199
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0958305X241291199?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:engenv:v:36:y:2025:i:2:p:1038-1062. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.