Ecuador is a biodiverse country with rich and fertile natural regions. In the coastal zone of Ecuador there is the large scale agriculture of a wide variety of crops which have positioned this country as one of the most important producers of bananas, palmito (palm heart), oil palm and other valuable products in South America. Moreover, Ecuador has unique vegetal species that are being exploited in small scale, presenting novel and potential sources of lignocellulose for the future.

In terms of abundance of lignocellulosic residues, the most conspicuous industries producing leftovers—as a consequence of the harvest or the extraction of valuable commodities—are the bananas farms, and the oil palm and sugar cane mills. There are still other important industries located mainly in the highlands such as flowers and cereals that produce lignocellulosic material potentially usable. Nevertheless, the amounts of these residues are not enough for huge biorefining installations, nor even available in an economical and technical way.

As for the availability of residues, studies carried out by researchers from the Neotropical Center for the Biomass Research at the Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Ecuador, reveal that there is a very high potential for lignocellulosic ethanol and biorefineries setting up in Ecuador. Nevertheless, there still exist constraints due to the disperse areas where the agricultural and industrial lignocellulosic materials are disposed; the local roads infrastructure and networks; the lack of development of markets for certain specific residues; the traditional uses and ways of final disposal; the physical and chemical composition of residues; and, the prices per dry ton. There are also social and environmental components to be taken into account when projecting lignocellulosic biorefineries to take the most of the agricultural and industrial byproducts, leftovers or residual material. In our survey we have considered the above-mentioned factors to develop the feasibility study for a biorefinery based on local lignocellulosic residues in the country.

In this survey we have pursued the following general objectives:

1. Evaluate the abundance and the potential of the main crops produced in Ecuador.

2. Determine the utilization, destiny, and availability of the agricultural residues.

3. Estimate the evolution of the agricultural production and residues generation in 5 years (until 2014).

Moreover, we have focused the following specific goals:

1. Determine the main crops in Ecuador, its exact geographical location, and the quantity of biomass residues produced per year.

2. Establish the temporality of crops and harvest.

3. Take current and historical data on volume of waste biomass produced to project future volumes, considering a period of five years. Analyze the succession of crops

4. Determine on the basis of the previous information, the more adequate zones where to install a future biorefinery plant.

In Ecuador there are three crops that worth to be studied with biorefining ends, because of their characteristics in terms of composition, final disposal, abundance and lack of sustainable use. These crops are: bananas, sugar cane and oil palm.

Table 3 shows the complete results of our survey on 13 different crops in Ecuador, the calculation of its dry mass and cellulose average contents as well as the potential for ethanol production. As it is going to be seen, Ecuador potentially could provide at least half of the ethanol needs for replacing gasoline in vehicles if the cellulose contained in agricultural residues were transformed into ethanol.

This suggests that biorefinery plants can be a reasonable and sustainable option for the post oil economy in Ecuador. Moreover, there still exists a huge potential for power generation if biogas from stills and residual lignin are burned in biorefineries.

There still exist other valuable products from biorefining of second generation ethanol such that can be produced from the residual water generated after distillation which, after an anaerobic digestion process, yields biogas, liquid and solid fertilizers (sludge). The non — hydrolyzed fibers as well as yeast biomass obtained after fermentation can be dried and sold as animal feed solid matter. The solid matter that can be recovered from fermenters before distillation is really considerable. Moreover, carbon dioxide from fermentation can be collected and treated to be sold in as much as during the fermentation for ethanol production, almost the same amount of CO2 is released. Theoretically, the production ratio of ethanol to CO2 in fermentation is 92:88. The uses for this gas are very wide including food, drink and chemical industries. CO2 is widely used in soft drinks and beer to carbonation of these beverages. It is also used to fill packs of vegetables and meet to keep it fresh. CO2 can also be used as raw material for the synthesis of methanol, formic acid, and urea. Other applications of CO2 include its use as a medium in supercritical CO2 extraction and in fire extinguishing equipment [4].