Development of a model for prediction of syngas composition using the equilibrium method and 3D CFD Simulation

This presentation demonstrates the development of a biomass gasification model that incorporates results of experimental data to validate the model`s accuracy. Gasification is a platform technology used to produce a gaseous product that contains a heating value from a solid fuel such as biomass that can be utilized to produce power, heat or synthetic liquids (Basu, 2010). Depending on where biomass is grown the same type of biomass can have a different elemental composition, resulting in a different composition of syngas. The use of gasification models to simulate the gasification process can be used to eliminate large costs associated with testing multiple types of biomass feedstocks. One of the most prominent issues with most models is the inability to account for biomass feedstocks with high alkali contents and tar production during the gasification process. Therefore the goal of the research is to develop an equilibrium model and a 3D computational fluid dynamic (CFD) model using ANSYS Fluent to simulate the gasification process for a variety of agricultural biomass feedstocks. The simulation results will be compared to experiments done using a circulating fluidized bed reactor. Correction factors will be implemented to the model results based on the 3D CFD simulation and the experiments, to account for the high amounts of alkali content in the agricultural biomass feedstocks. The effect of dry and hydrothermal torrefaction pre-treatment methods will be included in the experiment and additional correction factors will be implemented to account for these results

Mild Hydrothermal Liquefaction of High Water Content Agricultural Residue for Bio-Crude Oil Production: A Parametric Study

Depleting petroleum reserves together with the associated environmental concerns have intensified the exploration of alternatives to petroleum. Wet food processing wastes present promising bioresources for liquid fuel production via hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) followed by additional upgrading. In this study, tomato plant waste (TPW) was utilized as a feedstock for the production of bio-crude oils via HTL at medium-temperature (220⁻280 °C) in water or a water⁻ethanol (17/3, v/v) medium in a 600 mL autoclave reactor. Effects of various operating parameters, such as catalysts (H2SO4 or KOH), reaction time (15⁻60 min) and reaction temperature (220⁻280 °C) on product yields were investigated. This study showed that a high yield (45.1 wt%) of bio-crude oil was achieved from HTL of TPW in water⁻ethanol medium at 250 °C in the presence of acid catalyst H2SO4. The oil, gas and solid residue (SR) products were analyzed for their chemical and structural properties