Performance quantification of a cyclonic boiler using biomass sawdust

Fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas represent the prime energy sources at any place of the world. These fuels are largely used at steam systems for industrial applications to produce steam and heat through the burning process. Concern about the damage that gases emitted by burning processes can cause on the breathing air as well as in the atmosphere has encouraged studies on renewable fuels in order to reduce harmful emissions to the environment. In this context, any organic matter derived from plants, knows as biomass is an alternative to decrease the environmental issues. Cyclonic combustor well known as fluidized bed reactor promotes high efficiency combustion but experimental data are hard to obtain in the literature. This work presents data from a small laboratory boiler with a cyclonic combustor chamber equipped with an innovative calorimeter to measure steam quality. Data measured leads to the quantification of boiler thermal efficiency and gas species concentration. Experiments were performed using Cedrella fissilis biomass as sawdust which was previously characterized. Results showed a thermal efficiency of 44%, biomass energy conversion through combustion of 98% and CO emissions in the eluded gases were around 139 ppm. It was observed that the boiler operation is efficient to test different Amazonian biomass species as well as to provide new experimental data.