**2. Fibre morphology and chemical characterisation of OPEFB**

Empty fruit bunches are products from the oil palm processing industry. They have great potency as basic raw materials for fermentation because of their cellulose and hemicelluloses contents. The fibres of *Elaeis guineensis* empty fruit bunch (EFB) are of ligno-cellulosic materials, consisting on the average of an estimated cellulosic content of 30–50%, while the hemicelluloses and lignin constitute 15–35% and 20–30% respectively [8]. The OPEFB fibres, which are normally used as mulch for the palm oil mill, have been found to be a rich source of lignocellulosic material, especially cellulose, which can be 33.70–35.11% in composition for a press-shredded fibre [9]. According to reference [10], oil palm fibre exhibits the following percentage chemical composition as presented in **Table 1**.

A comparative broad varied value of the percentage chemical distribution of OPEFB fibres as reported by reference [11] is presented in **Table 2**.

As indicated in **Table 2**, cellulose is the main component in oil palm fibre, with the lignin content also relatively high. Hemicelluloses are of moderate quantity, and contain xylan as the main component. Extractives are of relative proportion, and can be found in traces and in considerable amount. According to reference [12], OPEFB has 50.9% cellulose, 29.6% hemicelluloses, 17.84% lignin, 3.4% ash and 3.21% extractives. Oil palm (OP) fibre contains comparatively high ash content, ranging from 1.6–6.69% [13]. This characteristic might contribute to an abnormal

## *Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunches (OPEFB) – Alternative Fibre Source for Papermaking DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.98256*


### **Table 1.**

*Chemical composition of oil palm fibre.*


#### **Table 2.**

*Chemical composition of OPEFB fibre (dry basis).*


#### **Table 3.**

*Physical and chemical characterisation of OPEFB fibre.*

mechanical wear of processing equipment. Thus, the potential build-up of silica in the black liquor recovery system might also be a source of concern in pulping oil palm material [14].

OP fibre is an important lignocellulosic raw material for the preparation of cost-effective and eco-friendly composite materials. One morphological peculiarity of oil palm fibres is that they have a much thicker cell wall when compared with those of wood, yielding substantially a high rigidity index. An electronic microscopic view of fibre cell wall layer reveals that oil palm fibres have structure similar

to those of wood cell wall, with lignin distributed highest in the middle lamella in comparison to that of other cells [15]. Fibrous strands of oil palm EFB have unique structure characterised by several large vessel elements in the core region surrounded by vascular fibres [1].

According to reference [16], the average indices of the physical and chemical characterisation of OPEFB fibre can be presented as shown in **Table 3**.
