Can ionic liquids dissolve wood? Processing and analysis of lignocellulosic materials with 1-n-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride
Abstract
The bulk of the cellulose currently employed by industry is isolated from wood through Kraft pulping, a process which traditionally involves a barrage of environmentally detrimental chemicals and is undeniably ‘non-green.’ In this report we present a simple and novel alternative approach for the processing of lignocellulosic materials that relies on their solubility in solvent systems based on the ionic liquid (IL)