Delignification of Abaca Fiber (Musa textilis) as Potential Substitute for Eucalyptus pellita

Five years old Eucalyptus pellita is a raw material used to manufacture pulp in Indonesia. In the field, the cropping cycle of this wood is still considered too long, so the need to develop other alternative raw materials that have characteristics similar to the fiber planting a shorter cycle. One of the alternative raw materials is abaca fiber (Musa textilis). Abaca fiber is preferred over other fibers because of its good tensile strength and resistance to rotting. In the present work, delignification of abaca fiber was carried out by kraft pulping process and characterized in term of their mechanical properties. Abaca fibers were treated with kraft pulping and oxygen delignification. Eucalyptus kraft pulp was also characterized as a comparison. Kappa number and viscosity decreased when the active alkali charge increased. Kraft pulp abaca with high cooking results and good viscosity is easily delignified by converting oxygen to low kappa numbers (7-9) without significant loss in viscosity. In addition, from the final results, the kappa number and viscosity, it was shown that abaca pulp has very high strength. Although oxygen delignification for lower kappa quantities can be considered, in terms of the properties of the pulp the abaca fiber is suitable as a raw material for pulp.