The third event occurring above 500 °C is associated with CO and CO2 formation due to intense heat [16] (burning of the carbonaceous residue). Both cellulose and catalyst can be responsible for this final thermal decomposition event [16]. However, the intensity of the mass loss in the DTG curve of the catalyst (Fig. 1 B dashed line and zoomed in Fig. SI2) is higher than the intensity shown in the sample formed by pure cellulose and samples of the catalyst mixed with cellulose (Fig. 1B solid line). The maximum temperature of the TGA instrument is 900 °C which is not high enough to completely combust the inorganic carbon from the sample. No peak is observed for 100% cellulose sample while all other samples that contained even small amounts of catalyst showed peaks with high catalyst concentrations showing the largest peaks. Thus, in this temperature range decomposition is only attributed to inorganic carbon originating from the catalyst and not from the combustion of cellulose.