Bioenergetics: Open Access

Potential of "Montado" wastes as feedstock for thermal gasification

17^th World Congress on Biofuels and Bioenergy

April 03-04, 2023 | Barcelona, Spain

Catarina Nobre* and Paulo Brito

VALORIZA �?? Research Centre for Endogenous Resource Valorization, Polytechnic Institute of Portalegre, Campus Politécnico 11, 7300-555 Portalegre, Portugal

Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J Bio Energetics

Abstract:

The “Montado” ecosystem is composed mainly by Quercus species. It’s wastes, e.g. acorn wastes are mostly used for animal feed or left behind in the fields. In Portugal, 55% of these wastes (especially in the North and Alentejo regions) do not have any type of valorization. Due to their physical-chemical composition and relative abundance (average annual production of 400,000 t/y) acorn wastes, are a very interesting feedstock to use in energy recovery technologies, particularly thermal conversion processes aiming at producing renewable gases (e.g., syngas, hydrogen or biomethane). The present study aimed to investigate the gasification potential of “Montado” wastes, such as lignocellulosic materials and acorn wastes. Firstly, all of the feedstock was cleaned in a mechanical process using sieves and dried in a rotary dryer. These processes made it possible to separate the crumb from the by-products (acorn husks, lignocellulosic components, and leaves) through their density. The drying process reduced 25 wt.% moisture content from the feedstock. Feedstocks were then characterized (ultimate and thermogravimetric analysis) and subjected to gasification tests (600, 650 and 700 °C) to understand the influence of temperature on syngas quality, namely in H2 production potential. The results showed that increasing temperature increases the syngas heating value from 5.2 to 5.6 MJ/m3. The H2 concentration also increased from 15.5 to 17.6 vol.%. The highest cold gas efficiency (CGE) was obtained at the highest testing temperature with a value of around 70 %. Overall, these tests indicate that “Montado” wastes can be used as feedstock in gasification, yielding good quality syngas, with potential to further clean and purify for H2 production. Further testing varying other operational parameters (e.g, feeding rate, ER) is still needed to validate this approach, as well as a techno-economic assessment to study the feasibility of these wastes in syngas and renewable gases production. Acknowledgments: This research was funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P. (Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology) under the project UIDB/05064/2020 (VALORIZA – Research Centre for Endogenous Resource Valorization).

Biography :

Catarina Nobre is an auxiliary researcher at VALORIZA@IPPortalegre. She has a degree in Biochemistry (FCT-UAlg), an MSc in Energy and Bioenergy (FCT-NOVA) and a PhD in Energy and Bioenergy (FCT-NOVA). Her main research interest’s focus on thermochemical conversion processes applied to lignocellulosic biomass waste, municipal solid waste and waste-derived fuels, production of liquid biofuels and more recently, in the production of renewable gases (hydrogen and biomethane). As a result of her research activities, she has contributed to about 60 publications, including scientific articles, book chapters, conference papers, theses, abstracts and posters.