摘要 |
A method for producing molasses by repeating a process of preparing a slurry of a pretreated cellulose-containing biomass, hydrolyzing the slurry using cellulase from filamentous fungi, then subjecting the hydrolyzate to solid-liquid separation into a solution component and hydrolysis residue, filtering the solution component through an ultrafiltration membrane and recovering the cellulase from filamentous fungi as a non-permeate, and recovering molasses as a permeate; wherein the purpose is to use the wash solution, obtained by washing the separation membrane after the solution component has been filtered through an ultrafiltration membrane, the cellulase from filamentous fungi has been recovered as a non-permeate, and molasses has been recovered as a permeate, when preparing a slurry of pretreated cellulose-containing biomass for subsequent molasses production processes. This makes it possible to suppress the adsorption of cellulase from filamentous fungi to the hydrolysis residue of the cellulose-containing biomass and efficiently recover and/or reuse the &bgr;-glucosidase, which plays an important role in the hydrolysis reaction in particular; and keeps the molasses production cost low. |