Technical feasibility of producing binder-free water hyacinth briquettes for domestic energy use

Production of biomass briquettes of good strength and combustion characteristics usually requires the addition of a binder material to the feedstock. This study was aimed at developing a methodology for producing briquettes from water hyacinth at low compression pressures without using a binder material. Fresh water hyacinth was chopped to a maximum length of 3 cm, sun-dried to a moisture content of about 10%, mixed with shredded waste office paper in four water hyacinth to paper proportions on weight basis (100:0, 90:10, 80:20 and 70:30). The mixtures were soaked in water for three days and briquetted using a 6-cylinder screw briquetting machine. The resulting briquettes were subjected to standard strength and combustion tests. A Completely Randomized Design with four treatments replicated five times was used as the experimental design. Results from the study indicate no significant differences in compressed density, relaxed density, relaxation ratio and calorific value between the briquettes. The results further indicate that briquettes made without a binder material have significantly low but adequate shatter resistance, low ignition time, high burning rate and take a longer time to bring water to boil. It can be concluded that good quality water hyacinth briquettes can be produced at low compression pressures without using a binder material. This methodology can potentially increase adoption of water hyacinth briquettes in areas with poor access to binder materials. The originality of the research is the development of a water hyacinth briquetting methodology that does not use binder materials.