a b s t r a c t
Mediterranean countries are faced with severe water shortage and unavailability of agricultural
land that limit the cultivation of energy crops that supply the feedstock for biofuel
production. A possibility would be to use Ferula communis that is encountered in Cyprus
and other Mediterranean countries, growing wild in pastures. Its flower stalks contain
sugars and starch that were measured to be 0.50e0.55 kg kg1, based on dry material. The
ethanol is produced by fermentation of the juice extracted by crashing and pressing the
flower stalks of the plant. The first stage of the process was cooking the juice at
a temperature of 95 C, combined by liquefaction and saccharification of the starch using
enzymes, like alpha amylase and glucoamylase. The process was followed by fermentation
of the juice for three days and finally distillation of ethanol. The alcohol yield per kilogram
dry stalks was 55.8 cm3 kg1, compared to the theoretical value of 57.3 cm3 kg1, mainly
due to the incomplete fermentation of the sugars. The plant seems to be a potential energy
plant for ethanol production in arid regions cultivated on degraded land with minimal
attention.