Adiabatic fixed bed gasification of dairy biomass with air and steam

Including dairy biomass (DB) as feedstock in gasification processes for locally based power generation could mitigate the environmental impact from DB produced in large US farms (56 million dry tons per year) and fossil-fuels emissions, since biomass is a CO2 neutral fuel. The current paper presents experimental results obtained from adiabatic, fixed bed gasification of DB using air and steam as oxidizers. The effect of equivalence ratio (ER) and steam to fuel ratio (S:F) ratio on temperature profile, gas composition (CO, CO2, H2, N2, CH4, and C2H6), gross heating value (HHV) and energy conversion efficiency (ECE) are discussed. The results show that the peak temperature (Tpeak), ECE, and CO decrease and H2 and CO2 increase with increase in ER; the increase in S:F at same ER increases H2, CO2, CH4, HHV, and ECE, and decreases CO.