Steam Gasification of Bio-Oil and Bio-Oil/Char Slurry in a Fluidized Bed Reactor

Abstract

Bio-oil/char mixtures and whole bio-oil from rapid pyrolysis of woody biomass are potential feeds for synthesis gas production via steam gasification. A 7.8 cm diameter, atmospheric pressure, fluid bed gasifier was constructed and operated with either a nickel-containing steam reforming catalyst or silica sand as bed material. Both bio-oil and a slurry of 80 wt % bio-oil and 20 wt % char were tested as feedstocks. Effects of bed temperature, steam to carbon molar ratio, and space velocity on gaseous component yields and carbon conversion are reported for both feedstocks using catalytic and noncatalytic bed material. At the moderate temperatures (<840 °C) of the experiments, carbon conversion is incomplete, and some mixed hydrocarbons are present in the produced gases. Yields of the main gas constituents are compared with an equilibrium model which was modified to correct for these two factors. Observations are made on stability and attrition issues with the catalyst.

Gasification of Wood Bio-Oi

“…The deviation from equilibrium at lower temperatures is also reported by Sakaguchi et al (Sakaguchi et al, 2010). At 1200°C the thermodynamic equilibrium begins to establish.…”

“…Czernik et al obtained hydrogen in a fluidized bed reactor from the carbohydrate derived fraction of wood bio-oil with a yield of about 80% of theoretical maximum (Czernik et al, 2002). The catalytic steam reforming of the bio-oil or the model oxygenates (e.g., ethanol, acetic acid) has been widely explored via various catalysts, e.g., Ni-based catalysts (Sakaguchi et al, 2010), Mg-doped catalysts (Garcia et al, 2000) and noble metal-loaded catalysts (Goula et al, 2004;Rioche et al, 2005;Trimm et al, 1997). Noble metals (Pt, Ru, Rh) are more effective than the Ni-based catalysts and less carbon depositing.…”

Process modelling of biomass conversion to biofuels with combined heat and power

“…However, this methodology has the drawback in terms of storage of the mixture due to deterioration of bio-oil quality (Zhang et al, 2013) and also operational problems during bio-fuels production (Bridgwater, 2009;Sakaguchi et al, 2010) in presence of ash content available in biochar. Therefore, the base pyrolysis model proposed in this study is considered as a significantly efficient design for biomass conversion to bio-fuels with on-site heat and power.…”

Gasification of waste rigid polyurethane foam: optimizing operational conditions

“…These parameters are also important operating variants in controlling the WRPUF gasification performance, especially the process temperature and catalysis. The catalytic gasification of carbonaceous materials is a widely employed technique that seeks both the reduction of tar production and the increase of the combustible gas [9]. However, there were few research studies on combustible gas from direct gasification of WRPUF [10].…”