Microwave-assisted biorefinery: sawdust pyrolysis
On one hand, high-temperature biorefinery applications are necessary to overcome heterogeneity and recalcitrance of some biomass wastes. On the other, the literature offers overwhelming evidence that microwave heating leads to enhanced reaction rates, higher product selectivity and quality, and lower temperature requirements in a multitude of chemical reactions and thermo-physical applications. Yet, investigations of high-temperature microwave biorefineries are limited in the literature. This work describes a preliminary investigation of the effect of microwave heating on waste biomass (sawdust) pyrolysis. Experimental runs were carried out on microwave-assisted conversion of biomass in a bench-scale microwave oven modified to operate under pyrolytic conditions. Microwave pyrolysis produced non-condensable gases, bio-oil, and bio-char from the as-received sawdust. Initial observations indicate that total removal of volatiles could be achieved within 3-4min. Only a fraction of condensable gases was recovered as bio-oil due to their significantly low partial pressure. Further, temperature measurement inside the microwave cavity remains problematic. Bio-oil recovery (by condensation and absorption) and temperature measurement must be improved before microwave heating could be established as an effective tool in biorefinery applications.
Biorefinery microwave pyrolysis thermochemical bio-oil bio-char
Amr SOBHY Jamal CHAOUKI
Department of Chemical Engineering, Ecole Polytechnique de Montréal, Québec, Canada
国际会议
北京
英文
608-613
2010-05-17（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）