per million of triton u2122 x 100 c 14 h 22 o c 2 h 4 o n or nonidet u2122 p40 nonylphenyl polyethylene glycol but not tween u2122 80 polyoxyethylene 20 sorbitan monooleate or sodium dodecyl sulphate are added to the solution this causes the lignin suspended in the water washes to flocculate facilitating harvesting of the washed lignin the effects of detergents and ammonium salts are additive the use of ammonium chloride to aid in the harvesting of washed lignin precipitates may be particularly advantageous as ammonium chloride is volatile and excess ammonium chloride can thus be easily removed from the harvested lignin during the drying process ethanol may also be used to recover the washed lignin at low concentrations for example less than 35 v v ethanol induces the precipitation of lignin from a water suspension the use of ethanol in this process is particularly advantageous because it is volatile and can thus be easily removed from the harvested lignin during the drying process raw lignin material isolated from salix viminalis or salix schwerinii u2018 kinuyanagi u2019 using the process described above employing 70 aqueous ethanol at 185 u00b0 c for 60 minutes and harvested by precipitation and centrifugation from the black liquor or using the dissolved gas flotation described above was shown to have a high degree of similarity to natural lignin to retain a high degree of reactivity and to be relatively pure with a minimal amount of carbohydrate contamination in preferred embodiments isolated lignin preparations of the present invention comprise less than about 1 0 sugars in some embodiments less than about 0 2 sugars.