Effect of Grinding and Extraction of Lignocellulosic Fiber on Oil Sorption

摘要

Cotton, a lignocellulosic fiber and environment friendly natural material, was tested for its ability to sorb diesel oil from the pure diesel oil bath and the diesel oil containing water bath. The fiber was ground to disrupt the lumen structure or extracted with diethyl ether to remove wax from cotton. Diethyl ether is an organic solvent and extracts only extractives in the cell wall. Oil sorption capacity was the highest in control as 30.6 g/g in the pure diesel oil bath, and the lowest in ground cotton as 0.8 g/g in the diesel oil containing water bath. Cotton is mainly composed of hydrophilic components and sorb water more easily than oil. As a result diesel oil sorption capacity was much higher in the oil bath than in the water bath. However, after grinding and passing through 20 mesh screen (0.86 cm), wax is preserved but the lumen structure of cotton, of which the fiber length is about 18 mm, is disrupted by grinding and can not hold oil. Therefore, the diesel oil sorption capacity of cotton was decreased significantly to 5.2 g/g in the pure diesel oil bath, and to 0.8 g/g in the water bath, compared to those of control. And because wax is removed but lumen structure is not destroyed after diethyl ether extraction, the diesel oil sorption capacity decreased slightly to 27.7 g/g in the oil bath and to 7.5 g/g in the water. When cotton was presoaked in water, cotton sank during the presoaking process, and so the oil sorption capacity could not be determined. Grinding, extractingand presoaking all contributed to the changes in oil sorption capacity. The most significant change is attributed to the reduction in the particle size of cotton.