Thermogravimetric study on the influence of structural, textural and chemical properties of biomass chars on CO2 gasification reactivity

• CO2 gasification reactivity of various lignocellulosic chars were examined.
• Chars properties affect strongly samples gasification behavior.
• Initial gasification rate is affected by external surface, K content and D3/G ratio.
• Gasification rate behavior depends on the Alkali index at high conversion.

The present investigation aims to examine the influence of textural, structural and chemical properties of biomass chars on the CO2 gasification rate. Various lignocellulosic biomass chars were prepared under the same conditions. Different analytical techniques were used to determine the char properties such as Scanning Electronic Microscopy, nitrogen adsorption manometry, Raman spectroscopy and X Ray Fluorescence. Gasification tests were carried out in a thermobalance under 20% CO2 in nitrogen at 800 °C.Significant differences of the total average reactivity were observed with a factor of 2 between the prepared chars. Moreover, different behaviors of gasification rate profiles versus conversion were obtained. This difference of behavior appeared to be correlated with the biomass char properties. Hence, up to 70% of conversion, the gasification rate was shown to depend on the char external surface and the potassium content. At higher conversion ratio, a satisfactory correlation between the Catalytic Index and the average gasification rate was identified. The results highlight the importance of knowing both textural and structural properties and mineral contents of biomass chars to predict fuel reactivity during CO2 gasification processes. Such behavior prediction is highly important in the gasifiers design for char conversion.