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Syngas Performance of Biomass Gasification Using Oil Palm Fronds
Authors: Nurul ‘Ain Hashim, Norzanah Rosmin, Aede Hatib Musta’amal, Ir Baharruddin Ishak, J. P. Barton
Number of views: 333
This paper presents the syngas performance of oil palm fronds (OPF) using a downdraft gasification method. So far, no biogas-OPF based power plant project has been developed in Malaysia even though the production of OPF is enormous. Initially, the empirical formula of OPF is determined before the gasification system can be modeled. The model of the gasification system in a downdraft gasifier is based on four zones; the drying zone, the pyrolysis zone, the oxidation zone and the reduction zone. The main advantage of the proposed method in this work is that the chemical reactions that occur in each zone are balanced using “kilogram” terms, thus eliminating the typical “mass” equations. Using “kilogram” terms overcomes the ambiguous process of chemical reaction during mole separation in each sub-model. In this study, the composition, calorific value (CV) and energy of syngas produced from OPF downdraft gasification are analyzed using Matlab/Simulink software. The model also takes into consideration the OPF moisture content as well as air fuel ratio. It is found that the CV of syngas reduced from 8.5 MJ/m3 to 6.387 MJ/m3 and the energy reduced from 2.224 kWh/m3 to 1.774 kWh/m3 as the moisture content increased from 5% to 20%. The CV also reduced from 8.132 MJ/m3 to 4.137 MJ/m3 and the energy reduced from 2.259 kWh/m3 to 1.149 kWh/m3 when air fuel ratio increased from 0.26 to 0.6.