Performance investigation of a gasifier and gas engine system operated on municipal solid waste briquettes

Abstract

Municipal solid waste (MSW) and charcoal can be used as a substitute fuel in a gas engine. In this work, performance of a downdraft gasifier and gas engine system operated on MSW briquette fuel was investigated. Experimental test was carried out on a 62 kW, four-cylinder, naturally aspirated engine coupled to a 20 kW dynamometer. The downdraft gasifier was used to generate producer gas from MSW briquettes and charcoal. The engine load was varied between 1.5-9.0 kW. Biomass consumption, producer gas production, cold gas efficiency, thermal efficiency of the gas engine, carbon monoxide (CO), hydrocarbon (HC) emissions and exhaust temperature were evaluated. The MSW briquette fuelled operation was compared against that with charcoal. It was found that, the use of MSW briquette led to lowering performance of the downdraft gasifier and gas engine system, in comparison with the use of charcoal. Maximum cold gas and thermal efficiencies obtained were 64.6% and 16% at 4.5 kW and 9 kW loading, respectively. The CO and HC emissions of the gas engine operated on MSW briquettes were higher than that on charcoal, while the exhaust temperatures were similar. ©2019. CBIORE-IJRED. All rights reserved

Production of Producer Gas from Densified Agricultural Biomass in Downdraft Gasifier and Its Application to Small Diesel Engines

“…According to the report, the cold gas efficiency was in a comparable range of 72%-76% for oil palm frond wastes and 66%-70% for tung tree wastes [15]. Further, it was also comparable to the downdraft gasifier efficiency of 62% using charcoal in the gasification for ceramic firing process [26], the range of 62%-69% using agricultural waste [27], and an average of 65% using briquette fuel from municipal solid waste [18].…”

“…Moreover, the performance of gas engines used to generate power was evaluated by using producer gas from gasification. The cold gas efficiency obtained from the gasification of municipal solid waste briquette fuel was around 65% with an engine load of 45 kW and the maximum thermal efficiency of a small diesel engine was 16% [18]. So far, there are a relatively small number of reports on gasification of agricultural residues.…”

“…where Q g is producer gas flow rate (Nm 3 /h), W c is biomass feed rate (kg/h) [15][16][17][18][19][20].…”

“…where H g is lower heating value of producer gas (kJ/Nm 3 ), Q g is producer gas flow rate (Nm 3 /s), M s is biomass consumption (kg/s), H s is heating value of biomass (kJ/kg) [15,18].…”

“…where • m f is the mass flow rate of biomass (kg/h) and biodiesel (kg/h), τ is the small engine torque (Nm) and N is the engine speed of small diesel engine (s −1 ). Brake thermal efficiency (BTE) [18,23]:…”