Biomass Carbonization: Process Options and Economics for Small Scale Forestry Farms☆

Abstract Bioenergy represents a unique opportunity for forestry companies to diversify the sources of income and create new stable business opportunities: a large number of initiatives has started in the last decades especially regarding decentralized power generation; nevertheless the conversion of the farmers to energy producers is not a trivial issue. The present work has focused on a possible alternative to biopower generation for forestry farms: the biomass carbonization (i.e. biomass slow pyrolysis). Charcoal making presents good prerequisite conditions for successful biomass based systems in the forestry sector: the system results incentive-independent, the power generation represents the co-product of a different primary production (resulting a real additional income), the plant capital cost is affordable for small scale farmers, operations requires technical skills normally available in the forestry sector and the reliability of the system is proven and credible, reducing the risks contained in business plans based on "number of hours of operation over several years". Moreover charcoal is a well known product, familiar to forestry companies for a very long time, the market is well defined, the technology is known but still offers opportunities for further improvements (in terms of efficiency, costs and environmental impacts), the technology does not present major risk, the investment is well suited to small farmers and the process and technology gives a great opportunity for small scale and local supply chain development. Based on these considerations, the present work investigated the technological opportunities for small scale charcoal making systems. Various process configurations have been examined, focusing on advantages and disadvantages representative of each solution in view of small scale application suitable for the Italian case and a designed pilot plant has been proposed

Autothermal biochar production and characterization at pilot scale

The present work reports on the results from the validation campaign of an autothermal pilot carbonization unit (CarbON) and on the characterization of the produced biochar and pyrolysis vapors. The proposed pilot plant leverages the simplicity and effectiveness of autothermal operations together with open top, downdraft design, to bring to the small scale the performance of larger installations. In autothermal operation, heat for the process is internally provided by combusting part of the feedstock and evolved volatiles inside the reactor, the so called “oxidative pyrolysis”. Please click on the file below for full content of the abstract

Photography-based taxonomy is inadequate, unnecessary, and potentially harmful for biological sciences

The question whether taxonomic descriptions naming new animal species without type specimen(s) deposited in collections should be accepted for publication by scientific journals and allowed by the Code has already been discussed in Zootaxa (Dubois & Nemésio 2007; Donegan 2008, 2009; Nemésio 2009a–b; Dubois 2009; Gentile & Snell 2009; Minelli 2009; Cianferoni & Bartolozzi 2016; Amorim et al. 2016). This question was again raised in a letter supported by 35 signatories published in the journal Nature (Pape et al. 2016) on 15 September 2016. On 25 September 2016, the following rebuttal (strictly limited to 300 words as per the editorial rules of Nature) was submitted to Nature, which on 18 October 2016 refused to publish it. As we think this problem is a very important one for zoological taxonomy, this text is published here exactly as submitted to Nature, followed by the list of the 493 taxonomists and collection-based researchers who signed it in the short time span from 20 September to 6 October 2016

Mass and energy balances of an autothermal pilot carbonization unit

The CarbOn pilot plant is a continuous biomass carbonization system, rated for a capacity of up to 50 kg h−1 and based on open top, downdraft technology, operating in oxidative pyrolysis in the temperature range of 500–650 °C and equivalence ratio (ER) between 0.1 and 0.2. In the reported validation tests, carried out on small size chestnut woodchips, charcoal mass yield in excess of 22.4 ± 0.7 wt% (dry base) has been achieved, with a fixed carbon content higher than 85 wt% (dry base). The fixed carbon yield (FCy) was 18.2 ± 2.2 wt% (dry base), the char carbon yield (CCy) 38.3 ± 1.6 wt% (dry base) and the net energy conversion efficiency to char (ε) equal to 41.2 ± 2.2% (wet base). Volume concentration of permanent gases in the pyrolysis vapors and condensable species were also measured before incineration and critically compared against literature data. The organic condensate from oxidative pyrolysis was obtained as 4.9 wt% of the dry biomass, and around 58 wt% of its constituents have been identified; in order of decreasing abundance, the organic fraction of condensate was composed of organic acids, aromatics, furans, anhydrous sugars, phenols, methanol, PAHs, acetaldehyde, ketones. Measured and calculated performance data shows that the pilot unit can produce high quality charcoal, meeting and exceeding the product specifications set by standard EN 1860-2 for BBQ lump charcoal as well as those set forth by international voluntary standards on biochar quality for soil application

Prospective minimally invasive pancreatic resections from the IGOMIPS registry: a snapshot of daily practice in Italy on 1191 between 2019 and 2022

This retrospective analysis of the prospective IGOMIPS registry reports on 1191 minimally invasive pancreatic resections (MIPR) performed in Italy between 2019 and 2022, including 668 distal pancreatectomies (DP) (55.7%), 435 pancreatoduodenectomies (PD) (36.3%), 44 total pancreatectomies (3.7%), 36 tumor enucleations (3.0%), and 8 central pancreatectomies (0.7%). Spleen-preserving DP was performed in 109 patients (16.3%). Overall incidence of severe complications (Clavien-Dindo & GE; 3) was 17.6% with a 90-day mortality of 1.9%. This registry analysis provided some important information. First, robotic assistance was preferred for all MIPR but DP with splenectomy. Second, robotic assistance reduced conversion to open surgery and blood loss in comparison to laparoscopy. Robotic PD was also associated with lower incidence of severe postoperative complications and a trend toward lower mortality. Fourth, the annual cut-off of & GE; 20 MIPR and & GE; 20 MIPD improved selected outcome measures. Fifth, most MIPR were performed by a single surgeon. Sixth, only two-thirds of the centers performed spleen-preserving DP. Seventh, DP with splenectomy was associated with higher conversion rate when compared to spleen-preserving DP. Eighth, the use of pancreatojejunostomy was the prevalent reconstruction in PD. Ninth, final histology was similar for MIPR performed at high- and low-volume centers, but neoadjuvant chemotherapy was used more frequently at high-volume centers. Finally, this registry analysis raises important concerns about the reliability of R1 assessment underscoring the importance of standardized pathology of pancreatic specimens. In conclusion, MIPR can be safely implemented on a national scale. Further analyses are required to understand nuances of implementation of MIPR in Italy