Effects of wood biomass type and airflow rate on fuel and soil amendment properties of biochar produced in a top‐lit updraft gasifier

Abstract

In this study, the effects of biomass type and airflow rate on the fuel and soil amendment properties of a solid byproduct (biochar, BC) produced by gasification in a top‐lit updraft reactor are studied. The results indicate that biomass with the highest fuel value index produces BC with the highest quality as a solid fuel. The best properties as a soil amendment are reached by Gua‐30‐BC as follows: the cation‐exchange capacity (CEC) of 18.6 meq/100 g, the water holding capacity (WHC) of 438%, and the total oxidizable organic carbon (TOC) of 14.2%. When the airflow increases from 20 to 40 L/min, the properties of pine BC as a solid fuel are affected. An increase in the gasification temperature leads to a diminished bulk density. Moreover, the ash content increases affecting the heating value of BC, which decreases from 27.71 to 25.5 MJ/kg. The best properties of BC as a solid fuel are reached at 20 L/min. The properties of BC as a soil amendment are affected with increased airflow as follows: the CEC decreases by 22.8%, TOC increases by 232.3%, and WHC increases by 7.6%. The best properties of BC as a soil amendment are obtained at 40 L/min. © 2018 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 38:e13105, 2019

Analysis of biochars produced from the gasification of Pinus patula pellets and chips as soil amendments

“…Finally, heavy metals contents were not found in the PL-BC and CH-BC, as it was indicated by the NTC5167 (ICONTEC 2011). Similar results were reported by Díez and Pérez (2019) when characterized BCs derived from the gasification of different forest species (wood chips). Therefore, according to the properties of PL-BC and CH-BC, these BCs can be used as soil amendments, mainly acid ones (Bayu et al 2017).…”

“…The difference in the MC between PL-BC and CH-BC was lower than 5 %. Even though the temperatures during the gasification process were higher than 700 °C inside the reactor (González and Pérez 2019), the MC of 11,13 wt% for the PL-BC and 11,63 wt% for the WC-BC was ascribed to the steam produced from the oxidation reactions, which condenses on the solid carbonaceous matrix of the BC due to the gasification reactor settings (Díez and Pérez 2019).…”

“…This result was attributed to the opening of the closed pores and the widening of the open pores in the BCs due to the VM release during the biomass gasification process. Consequently, the surface area rose because of the increased number of pores and their average radius (Hernández et al 2016), which favors the WHC (Díez and Pérez 2019). It is worth noting that both properties, TOC and WHC, were higher for the PL-BC when compared to the CH-BC (~29 % higher TOC and ~15 % higher WHC for the PL-BC).…”

Co-gasification of biomass and coal in a top-lit updraft fixed bed gasifier: Syngas composition and its interchangeability with natural gas for combustion applications

“…The obtained syngas passes through a bed of char and ashes produced by the downward-moving ignition front. Published studies also refer to the TLUD operation as inverted downdraft [28], [29], reverse downdraft [30]- [32], and reverse combustion [33]. TLUD-related applications are biochar [34], syngas [35], [36],…”

Influence of Oxidant Agent on Syngas Composition: Gasification of Hazelnut Shells through an Updraft Reactor

“…Götz et al [17] and Brunner et al [18] explained the EU Horizon 2020 project HiEff-BioPower, which aims to develop a new, innovative, fuel-flexible, and highly efficient medium-scale biomass CHP (combined heat and power) technology for a capacity range of 1 to 10 MW total energy output. Other important recent research studies on the biomass gasification using updraft reactors include the effects of wood biomass type and airflow rate on the fuel and soil amendment properties of a solid by-product [19]; an experimental study of wood chips and grass waste gasification [20]; as well as lab-scale hydrogen production by supervised machine learning algorithms [21].…”