In a sugar mill, the crushed sugarcane is washed to go for juice extraction. The resulted juice can be used for sugar as well as ethanol production. Bagasse is the lignocellulosic coproduct after the sugarcane is crushed for juice extraction [66]. Approximately, it consists of 50%
cellulose, 25% hemicellulose and 25% lignin [67]. Bagasse has been widely used as the fuel for generating electricity. One metric ton of bagasse containing 50% moisture will produce heat equivalent to that from 0.333 tons of fuel oil [68]. This coproduct has been considered for such purpose in different countries such as Zimbabwe [69], Nicaragua [70] and Brazil [71]. Another large utilization of bagasse is in paper and pulp industry. This was patented in 1981 [72] and found huge application in many places such as India as early as 1990 [73]. The particleboard production is another industrial utilization of this biomass [74]. Bagasse has been also used in composting to a limited extent [68] and use of fungal strains on bagasse has been reported to produce compost with low pH and high soluble phosphorus [75]. Fermentation of bagasse using mold cultures was also considered to produce animal feed [76].

As a lignocellulosic material, bagasse has the potential of a feedstock for biofuel production either by gasification or hydrolysis method. In this context, still the biofuel production from bagasse via gasification has not been reported. However, as an alternative method competitive to the direct combustion of bagasse, gasification using a two-stage reactor has been proposed to be economically viable and more efficient [77]. Also, studies have been conducted in order to improve the bagasse gasification as far as retention and separation of alkali compound is concerned during the process. Considering the lignocellulosic ethanol production from bagasse, several investigations has been published on liquid hot water, steam pretreatment [78] and acid hydrolysis of it [79] as well as simultaneous saccharification and co-fermentation (SSCF) method [80]. As published in 2004, about 180 МГ of dry sugarcane bagasse is produced globally and can be utilizud ioproduce abaui51GL of Uioethanol SSS].

The expansion in producSionol thesugas-baeed ethanolisehe ofthe kea ractorsafSectingtiha bagasse production. The suuaicaneharvestoi Bsaztl, the global leadesof suaas-baied ethaaol, has shifted upward approximately U5%during; decent five hears frem425.4 MT m d006-07to 620.4 MT in 2010-11 (Figure 5) [82]. The ethanol production in Brazil generally shows a similar trend. To produce one litee ofelhanol, 12.U Kgoisudarcant isfeqenred-The welghtofthe produced bagasse is about 30% de fire weight tsf shgarcaneused for eugaror ethaaal production [66]. Therefore, the bagaste psoduction of Bsazfi in 0010-10 can be estimated sis more those 180 MT, almost equal to globalbodaase productionbefore2t04.

Figure 5. Brazilian sugarcane harvestand ethanolproduction(drawnfromdatareported in[82]).