IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/appene/v88y2011i3p899-908.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Downdraft gasification of pellets made of wood, palm-oil residues respective bagasse: Experimental study

Author

Listed:
  • Erlich, Catharina
  • Fransson, Torsten H.

Abstract

The downdraft gasification technology has an increased interest among researchers worldwide due to the possibility to produce mechanical and electrical power from biomass in small-scale to an affordable price. The research is generally focused on improvement of the performance and optimizing of a certain gasifier, on testing different fuels, on increasing the user-friendliness of the gasifier and on finding other uses for the product gas than in an IC-engine, for example liquid fuel production. The main objective with the gasification tests presented here is to further contribute in the field by studying the impact of the char bed properties such as char bed porosity and pressure drop on the gasification performance as well as the impact of fuel particle size and composition on the gasification process in one and the same gasifier. In addition, there is very little gasification data available in literature of "before disregarded" fuels such as sugar cane bagasse from sugar/alcohol production and empty fruit bunch (EFB) from the palm-oil production. By pelletizing these residues, it is possible to introduce them into downdraft gasification technology which has been done in this study. The results show that one and the same reactor can be used for a variety of fuels in pellet form, but at varying air-fuel ratios, temperature levels, gas compositions and lower heating values. Gasification of wood pellets results in a richer producer gas while EFB pellets give a poorer one with higher contents of non-combustible compounds. In this gasification study, there is almost linear relation between the air-fuel ratio and the cold-gas efficiency for the studied fuels: Higher air-fuel ratios result in better efficiency. The pressure drop in the char bed is higher for more reactive fuels, which in turn is caused by low porosity char beds.

Suggested Citation

  • Erlich, Catharina & Fransson, Torsten H., 2011. "Downdraft gasification of pellets made of wood, palm-oil residues respective bagasse: Experimental study," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 88(3), pages 899-908, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:88:y:2011:i:3:p:899-908
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306-2619(10)00345-4
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Stassen, H.E., 1995. "Small-Scale Biomass Gasifiers for Heat and Power," Papers 296, World Bank - Technical Papers.
    2. Dogru, M. & Howarth, C.R. & Akay, G. & Keskinler, B. & Malik, A.A., 2002. "Gasification of hazelnut shells in a downdraft gasifier," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 415-427.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chen, Wei & Annamalai, Kalyan & Ansley, R. James & Mirik, Mustafa, 2012. "Updraft fixed bed gasification of mesquite and juniper wood samples," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 454-461.
    2. Field, John L. & Tanger, Paul & Shackley, Simon J. & Haefele, Stephan M., 2016. "Agricultural residue gasification for low-cost, low-carbon decentralized power: An empirical case study in Cambodia," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 612-624.
    3. Przybyla, Grzegorz & Szlek, Andrzej & Haggith, Dale & Sobiesiak, Andrzej, 2016. "Fuelling of spark ignition and homogenous charge compression ignition engines with low calorific value producer gas," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 116(P3), pages 1464-1478.
    4. Demirbas, Ayhan, 2008. "Importance of biomass energy sources for Turkey," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(2), pages 834-842, February.
    5. Asadullah, Mohammad, 2014. "Biomass gasification gas cleaning for downstream applications: A comparative critical review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 118-132.
    6. Pérez-Fortes, Mar & Laínez-Aguirre, José Miguel & Arranz-Piera, Pol & Velo, Enrique & Puigjaner, Luis, 2012. "Design of regional and sustainable bio-based networks for electricity generation using a multi-objective MILP approach," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 79-95.
    7. Raman, P. & Ram, N.K. & Gupta, Ruchi, 2013. "A dual fired downdraft gasifier system to produce cleaner gas for power generation: Design, development and performance analysis," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 302-314.
    8. Chiang, Kung-Yuh & Lu, Cheng-Han & Lin, Ming-Hui & Chien, Kuang-Li, 2013. "Reducing tar yield in gasification of paper-reject sludge by using a hot-gas cleaning system," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 47-53.
    9. Mendiburu, Andrés Z. & Carvalho, João A. & Coronado, Christian J.R., 2014. "Thermochemical equilibrium modeling of biomass downdraft gasifier: Stoichiometric models," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 189-201.
    10. La Villetta, M. & Costa, M. & Massarotti, N., 2017. "Modelling approaches to biomass gasification: A review with emphasis on the stoichiometric method," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 71-88.
    11. Panwar, N.L. & Kothari, Richa & Tyagi, V.V., 2012. "Thermo chemical conversion of biomass – Eco friendly energy routes," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 1801-1816.
    12. Mauro Villarini & Vera Marcantonio & Andrea Colantoni & Enrico Bocci, 2019. "Sensitivity Analysis of Different Parameters on the Performance of a CHP Internal Combustion Engine System Fed by a Biomass Waste Gasifier," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-21, February.
    13. Nadia Cerone & Francesco Zimbardi, 2018. "Gasification of Agroresidues for Syngas Production," Energies, MDPI, vol. 11(5), pages 1-18, May.
    14. Datta, Amitava & Ganguly, Ranjan & Sarkar, Luna, 2010. "Energy and exergy analyses of an externally fired gas turbine (EFGT) cycle integrated with biomass gasifier for distributed power generation," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 341-350.
    15. Ma, Zhongqing & Zhang, Yimeng & Zhang, Qisheng & Qu, Yongbiao & Zhou, Jianbin & Qin, Hengfei, 2012. "Design and experimental investigation of a 190 kWe biomass fixed bed gasification and polygeneration pilot plant using a double air stage downdraft approach," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 140-147.
    16. Sharma, Avdhesh Kr., 2009. "Experimental study on 75kWth downdraft (biomass) gasifier system," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 34(7), pages 1726-1733.
    17. Huiyuan Shi & Wen Si & Xi Li, 2016. "The Concept, Design and Performance of a Novel Rotary Kiln Type Air-Staged Biomass Gasifier," Energies, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-18, January.
    18. Chen, Guanyi & Dong, Xiaoshan & Yan, Beibei & Li, Jian & Yoshikawa, Kunio & Jiao, Liguo, 2022. "Photothermal steam reforming: A novel method for tar elimination in biomass gasification," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 305(C).
    19. Smith Lewin, Caroline & Fonseca de Aguiar Martins, Ana Rosa & Pradelle, Florian, 2020. "Modelling, simulation and optimization of a solid residues downdraft gasifier: Application to the co-gasification of municipal solid waste and sugarcane bagasse," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 210(C).
    20. Ram, Narasimhan Kodanda & Singh, Nameirakpam Rajesh & Raman, Perumal & Kumar, Atul & Kaushal, Priyanka, 2019. "A detailed experimental analysis of air–steam gasification in a dual fired downdraft biomass gasifier enabling hydrogen enrichment in the producer gas," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 187(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:88:y:2011:i:3:p:899-908. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.