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Follow on Google News |  Forest Biofuels: High Efficiency Demonstrated in Biomass-to-‘syngas’ ExperimentsBy: Bio4Energy in cooperation with the SP ETC If the process proves to be as efficient in a future scale up to commercial levels, it could also be good news for the forestry industry at large, looking to use their residual fibre-based process streams in new products. Moreover, it would make forestry residue competitive with black coal in its use in commercial gasification process for making fuels and chemicals, in terms of cold-gas efficiency. This latter is a measure used by researchers of the chemical energy left in the synthesis gas resulting form the gasification process. The new findings result from two years' worth of research and development work by Bio4Energy scientists and technicians at the SP Energy Technology Center at Piteå (http://www.etcpitea.se/ "It is a milestone in our research. We are very proud with what we have achieved so far", said Magnus Marklund (mailto:%20% "The next step in our applied research will be to optimise the different subsystems in the process, which will render the technology even more viable", Marklund added. Fredrik Weiland (mailto:%20% "This is a good, competitive cold-gas efficiency… which can be compared to [that of] the fluidised-bed gasification technique where it reaches about 65 per cent", said Weiland. However, he pointed out, the energy requirement for biomass milling generally was somewhat higher in entrained-flow gasification compared with that entailed when using a fluidised bed in the gasification process. Judging from the literature, on a global scale more research has been done on biomass gasification methods using a fluidised bed as a reactor, compared with research having gone into pressurised entrained-flow gasification. However, scientists on the Bio4Energy Thermochemical Platform, of which Marklund and Weiland are part, have opted for developing the latter method both in terms of fundamental knowledge and pre-industrial trials designed to perfect the technology ahead of attempts to scale it up to commercial production levels by industry in the biorefinery sector. Despite its requiring higher temperatures, the scientists believe entrained-flow gasification will win out in the end where the purpose is to make a synthetic fuel. First because this type of gasification can be made to render a highly clean synthesis gas which can be turned directly into biofuel or an energy carrier such as methanol, without adding gas scrubbing as a process step. Second, and as the recent research findings from Bio4Energy would suggest, the scientists believe pressurised entrained-flow gasification can produce fuels which are more energy efficient. "We have characterised the [pressurised entrained-flow] "We have also obtained the answer to a range of research questions in terms of temperature and composition of the synthesis gas… This can be of great value for people who look at this from a system's perspective, for instance to see if producing fuels from the forest is cost competitive" "Our goal has been to show that it is possible to use a pressurised entrained-flow reactor to gasify pulverised biomass and that this is competitive in terms of cold-gas efficiency, and I feel we have achieved that", Weiland said. "But gasification of biomass is not as 'hot' as it used to be a number of years ago. This has partly to do with the [low] price of oil and electricity. Long-term incentives are needed", he said with reference to support measures of the type that governments can grant. End
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