Design and Development of Fast Pyrolysis Fluidized Bed Reactor for Bio-oil Production
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Date
2011-12
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Fast pyrolysis of biomass is the most promising technology of converting solid biomass to liquid
bio-oil as a renewable substitution of fossil resources in fuel and chemical feed stocks applications.
Ethiopia with abundant biomass resources especially from coffee processing industry has the
potential to provide an ideal platform for the development of this thermal conversion technology.
This thesis was aimed of developing a 145 mm reactor diameter pilot scale fast pyrolysis system
with coffee husk as the main feedstock.
For detail analysis of the fast pyrolysis system a two-stage fluidized bed reactor was designed
based on the fluidization technology with silica sand as the heat carrier to achieve rapid heat
transfer required for the reaction. The amount of silica sand required was determined from the
hydrodynamics and heat transfer performances. The assembly of the system consists of five main
sections. These are the feed hopper, reactor subsystems (reaction chamber, gas-preheating chamber,
plenum, and gas distributor plate), cyclone separator and condensation system. Smooth process and
substantial bio-oil yields could be achieved for the experiments carried out with the reaction
temperature within 300 to500 . But due to lack of appropriate fluidizing medium (lack of
continuous gas supply compressor) the maximum gas temperature in the reaction chamber achieved
was only 100 .
Key Words: Biomass, Fast pyrolysis, Bio-oil
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Keywords
Biomass; Fast pyrolysis; Bio-oil