[hank]

I think this is part organic and part inorganic. But if a moderator judges otherwise, sorry.

I'm working on the hydrothermal decomposition of hemicellulose and one of the reaction products is acetic acid. The incomplete reaction model I'm using says 20% of my original hemicellulose is converted into acetic acid. In comparison to other papers this seems to be too high. So were does my acetic acid go?
I know some H2, CH4, CO and CO2 is produced, but not in what quantities. I thought that detailed reaction kinetics on the subject would be "known", but I'm not able to find it.
A paper that is close by is: "Renewable hydrogen production by a mild-temperature steam reforming of the model compound acetic acid derived from bio-oil" by Z. Li et al from 2012.

[orgopete]

I don't know anything about this topic.

Is this the question? How does (hemi)cellulose, C6H12O6, decompose to CH3CO2H, 2xCO2, and 2xCH4? Since cellulose is a dehydro hexose, I wrote its MF as C6H12O6 (6C + 6H2O).

[Babcock_Hall]

hank,

Is the reaction done anaerobically (no overall oxidation), or is it done in the presence of oxygen?  If the former, it is sometimes helpful to look at the oxidation numbers of the reactant and products.