Assessment of bio-combustibles production via slow pyrolysis of wine industry residues
With the aim of evaluating the potential production of high energy solid and liquid bio-fuels, a laboratory scale fixed bed reactor (FBR) derived from the standard Gray-King (GK) assay test on coal was used to carry out fixed bed pyrolysis experiments on wine industry by-products. The present study provides results on the pyrolysis of grape marc, residual from wine-making process, consisting of 50% by weight of grape seeds and 50% by weight of grape skins, at temperature between 150 and 500 °C, holding time of 30 minutes. Pyrolysis mass yields of solid (char) and liquid (tar) products and their corresponding energy properties, as a function of reaction temperature, are reported and discusse…
Reactivity of cellulose during hydrothermal carbonization of lignocellulosic biomass
Abstract Hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) of pure cellulose (CE) and birchwood (BW) samples was carried out at temperatures between 160 and 280 °C, 0.5 h residence time and biomass-to-water ratio 1:5, to investigate the reactivity of cellulose in lignocellulosic biomass. Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) showed that the CE samples remained unaltered at temperatures up to 220 °C, but were significantly decomposed at 230 °C producing a thermal recalcitrant aromatic and high energy-dense material. FTIR showed that dehydration and aromatization reactions occurred at temperature equal or higher than 230 °C for the CE samples while a similar incre…