Publications Repository - Gdańsk University of Technology

The thermal pyrolysis of agriculture biomass has been studied in a fixed-bed reactor, wherethe pyrolysis was conducted at a steady temperature of 800◦C. This work analyses the pyrolysisproducts of six agricultural wastes: pistachio husks, walnut husks, sunflower hulls, buckwheat husks,corncobs and coconut shells. The conducted research compared examples of large waste biomassstreams from different parts of the world as a potential source of renewable energy. Additionally, thekinetics of the reaction with the activation energy were analyzed and calculated for all raw materialsin pyrolysis process. Biochars are characterised by higher combustion heat in comparison to the rawmaterial samples. The average value of the heat of combustion increased due to pyrolysis processfrom 10 MJ/kg, with minimal value of 2.7 MJ/kg (corncob) and maximum of 13.0 MJ/kg for coconut,which is also characterised by the maximal absolute combustion heating value (32.3 MJ/kg). Theincrease in calorific values varied from 15% to 172% (with 54% reference for wood chips), whichindicates that charring is an effective method for increasing the energy concentration. The obtainedbiochar were compared with wood chips, which are widely used solid fuel of organic origin. Thestudied biomass-derived fuels are characterised by lower ash contribution than wood. An analogousobservation was made for the obtained biochars, whose ash contribution was lower than for thechips in terms of both unit-mass and unit-combustion-heat. The main advantage of this method isthe production of solid fuel from biomass, which increases the calorific value and bulk density ofbiochar in comparison to raw material.

Authors

• Paweł Kazimierski,
• dr hab. inż. Katarzyna Januszewicz link open in new tab ,
• Wojciech Godlewski,
• Aleksander Fijuk,
• Tomasz Suchocki,
• Patryk Chaja,
• Beata Barczak link open in new tab ,
• Dariusz Kardaś