Preliminary studies on the treatment of wastewater from biomass gasification

•Purifying water–organic condensates from gasification of biomass was evaluated.•The best performance at a VH2O2Vcond.=6 and a VH2O2Fe=0.0375 ratio was observed.•Water–tar–dust and water–organic condensate from biomass conversion was characterized.

This paper presents completed research on the purification of undiluted raw water and organic condensates obtained in biomass thermal conversion processes such as gasification, which are rarely addressed in published studies. However, similar studies involving the characterization and purification of aqueous solutions obtained from process gas treatment after the gasification of biomass are available. Condensation of water–organic condensate from process gas helps to reduce the amount of water required by the purification process and the cost of the process technology and water consumption. Oil scrubbers can be used in this case instead of water scrubbers. In this case, the obtained condensate must be subjected to purification processes. This paper presents the results of our research, possible methods of treatment (chemical and biological methods), and the approximate cost of the reagents required for the purification of condensate for specific assumed degrees of purification.The best results from the chemical purification using the Fenton method were obtained with the ratio VH2O2/Vcond.=6.0VH2O2/Vcond.=6.0 and the ratio VH2O2Fe=0.0375. To prevent precipitation of ferric hydroxide, this value can be reduced 20-fold, which reduces the total degree of purification to 90%. The cost of almost complete cleaning of tested condensates was calculated to be approximately 2000 USD per/m3. This cost can be reduced by a factor of approximately four assuming 100% cleaning for 2-furaldehyde, furfuryl alcohol and phenol; acetaldehyde, propane-2-one (acetone), methanol and acetic acid are oxidized by 50%.