Pretreatment of biomass by torrefaction

Agricultural biomass has some drawbacks such as high moisture content, low energy density and wide distribution and as a result, the cost of transport and storage are high. Moreover, raw biomass has poor grindability so its use in a pulverized boiler or entrained flow gasifier is difficult. Torrefaction is a mild pyrolysis process carried out at temperatures ranging from 200°C to 300°C to deal with these problems. The cotton stalk and wheat straw were torrefied in a fix-bed reactor at moderate temperatures (200°C, 230°C, 250°C, 270°C and 300°C) under N₂ for 30 min. The biomass chars after torrefaction had higher energy density and improved grindability characteristics compared with raw biomass and they also showed hydrophobic characteristics. The volatiles consist of a condensable fraction and a non-condensable fraction. The former mainly contained water and tar (organic products but mainly acetic acid). The non-condensable products are typically comprised of CO₂, CO and a small amount of CH₄ and even trace H₂. The volatiles increased with an increase in the torrefaction temperature but the solid yield and the energy yield decreased. However, the grindability and energy density of the biomass char showed great improvement. A kinetic study on the generation of the main non-condensable gases was undertaken and we conclude that the gases are formed by parallel independent first-order reactions. Characteristic kinetic parameters for the generation of each gas were determined.