Experimental Investigation on Energy Recovery System for Continuous Biochar Production System

Abstract

Fossilfuel requirement is the necessity for fulfilling the global energy needs, which is increasing day by day due to this it will drain in future. Bio-energy became as one of the vital alternatives to replace fossil fuel. Thermochemical conversion of biomass for obtaining the bioenergy is getting more popular in the recent time. In the present study, slow pyrolysis is used for bio-energy production from the waste biomass available in the form of crop residues of Groundnut Shell (GS), Chana Straw (CS) and Wheat Straw (WS) using the developed continuous biochar production system (Pratap Kiln) to produce biochar. An energy recovery system consisting of cooling chamber was developed to recover the bio-oil from the waste flue gas (syngas). The pyrolysis of selected biomass was carried out at 450°C and residence time of about 4 min. The yield of biochar and bio-oil and syngas properties were determined. The maximum biochar yield was found in CS feedstock as 35% followed by WS and GS, i.e. 33% and 29%, respectively. The bio-oil recovery in GS, CS and WS was 31%, 26% and 30% respectively, whereas the syngas production was 40%, 39% and 37% respectively.