A pilot-scale study of wet torrefaction treatment for upgrading palm oil empty fruit bunches as clean solid fuel

International Conference on Biomass: Technology, Application, and Sustainable Development

生物科学;能源学;经济学

Gusman, M.H.^1 ; Sastroredjo, P.N.E.^1 ; Prawisudha, P.^1 ; Hardianto, T.^1 ; Pasek, A.D.^1

Faculty of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Bandung Institute of Technology, Bandung, Indonesia^1

关键词: Biomass-fired power plants;    Empty fruit bunches;    Energy dispersive X ray spectroscopy;    Palm oil empty fruit bunch;    Pilot-scale study;    Quantitative method;    Slagging and fouling;    Solid bio-fuels;   

Others  :  https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1755-1315/65/1/012003/pdf
DOI  :  10.1088/1755-1315/65/1/012003

学科分类：生物科学（综合）

来源: IOP

【 摘 要 】

Less utilized empty fruit bunch (EFB) is seldom used as solid biofuel due to its high alkali content that potentially cause ash deposit called slagging and fouling. This phenomenon could harm biomass-fired power plant equipment. Some pre-treatment of EFB is needed to reduce EFB ash deposit potential. The effect of wet torrefaction pre-treatment in laboratory scale was successfully proven in decreasing slagging and fouling potential while increasing EFB calorific value that could fulfill clean solid fuel criteria. This research focuses on wet torrefaction process that conducted on a pilot scale with the capacity of 250 liters. It was found that wet torrefaction process can improve the product's calorific value up to 9.41% while reduce its ash content down to 1.01% comparing to the raw EFB. The reduction of ash content also leads to the reduction of slagging and fouling tendency that presents in terms of alkali index. Alkali index is a quantitative method that can be calculated after obtaining metal oxides fraction on solid fuel. Metal oxides could be obtained by using energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy.