Publications

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The fast pyrolysis behaviour of pretreated banagrass was examined at four temperatures (between 400 and 600 C) and four residence times (between ∼1.2 and 12 s). The pretreatment used water washing/leaching to reduce the inorganic content of the banagrass. Yields of bio-oil, permanent gases and char were determined at each reaction condition and compared to previously published results from untreated banagrass. Comparing the bio-oil yields from the untreated and pretreated banagrass shows that the yields were greater from the pretreated banagrass by 4 to 11 wt% (absolute) at all reaction conditions. The effect of pretreatment (i.e. reducing the amount of ash, and alkali and alkali earth metals) on pyrolysis products is: 1) to increase the dry bio-oil yield, 2) to decrease the amount of undetected material, 3) to produce a slight increase in CO yield or no change, 4) to slightly decrease CO2 yield or no change, and 5) to produce a more stable bio-oil (less aging). Char yield and total gas yield were unaffected by feedstock pretreatment. Four other tropical biomass species were also pyrolyzed under one condition (450°C and 1.4 s residence time) for comparison to the banagrass results. The samples include two hardwoods: leucaena and eucalyptus, and two grasses: sugarcane bagasse and energy-cane. A sample of pretreated energy-cane was also pyrolyzed. Of the materials tested, the best feedstocks for fast pyrolysis were sugarcane bagasse, pretreated energy cane and eucalyptus based on the yields of 'dry bio-oil', CO and CO2. On the same basis, the least productive feedstocks are untreated banagrass followed by pretreated banagrass and leucaena.

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Techno-economic performances of Norwegian biojet fuel production via the Alcoholto- Jet and Fischer-Tropsch synthetic paraffinic kerosene routes were estimated based on adaptations of available literature data to Norwegian conditions. This paper reviews the deployment of feasible routes to sustainable jet fuel production for the short-to-medium term timeframe (2020-2025), with an emphasis on the Norwegian landscape. Given the fact that there are serious concerns regarding the availability and the sustainability of large-scale biofuels production both from oil seed plants and carbohydrates (sugars and starches) as well as the unsuitability of the Norwegian climate for oil seed or sugar/starch plant cultivation, only biojet fuels produced from lignocellulosic resources are considered. The short-to-medium term implies certified or near certified fuels. The most promising and feasible alternatives for Norwegian biojet fuel production are hence limited to FT-SPK and ATJ. The results suggest that, from a techno-economic point of view, production of jet fuel via the gasification-FT route is more favorable than the alcohol to jet fuel route. This is attributed to the inclusion of the alcohol production step. Feedstock price is the main operating cost for both of the routes. The current cost of production of jet fuel under Norwegian conditions for gasification FT route is estimated between 43 USD/GJ and 47.4 USD/GJ, and for the ATJ route, between 54 USD/GJ and 60 USD/GJ.

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The viability of thermochemically-derived biofuels can be greatly enhanced by reducing the process parasitic energy loads. Integrating renewable power into biofuels production is one method by which these efficiency drains can be eliminated. There are a variety of such potentially viable "hybrid-renewable" approaches; one is to integrate concentrated solar power (CSP) to power biomass-to-liquid fuels (BTL) processes. Barriers to CSP integration into BTL processes are predominantly the lack of fundamental kinetic and mass transport data to enable appropriate systems analysis and reactor design. A novel design for the reactor has been created that can allow biomass particles to be suspended in a flow gas, and be irradiated with a simulated solar flux. Pyrolysis conditions were investigated and a comparison between solar and non-solar biomass pyrolysis was conducted in terms of product distributions and pyrolysis oil quality. A novel method was developed to analyse pyrolysis products, and investigate their stability.

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