The reaction kinetics of Iroko and Mahogany were studied using TGA. The pyrolysis process was achieved using six different heating rates of 2,5,8,12,15 and 20˚C. A 15˚C/min heating rate was used for gasification in steam at different temperatures while varying the concentrations of nitrogen and steam in the process. The kinetic parameters, activation energy and pre exponential factor, were obtained by implementing two chosen kinetic models. These models are: Friedman’s Iso-conversional Method, Flynn-Wall-Ozawa Method (FWO). There were substantial differences in the values of the kinetic triplets found from the experiments. Due to the substantial differences in the values, it was not the best way to perform this kind of analysis (which is the traditional way) but instead to use pure regression analysis; but using it for the whole data set (that means for all heating rates) and minimize the difference with experimental data.

<p>Tanzania has a characteristic developing economy, which is dependent on agricultural productivity.  About 90% of the total primary energy consumption of the country is from biomass.  Since the biomass is mostly consumed at the household level in form of wood fuel, it is marginally contributing to the commercial energy supply.  However, the country has abundant energy resources from hydro, biomass, natural gas, coal, uranium, solar, wind and geothermal.  Due to reasons that include the limited technological capacity, most of these resources have not received satisfactory harnessing.  For instance: out of the estimated 4.7GW macro hydro potential only 561MW have been developed; and none of the 650MW geothermal potential is being harnessed.  Furthermore, besides the huge potential of biomass (12 million tons of oil equivalent), natural gas (45 million cubic metres), coal (1,200 million tones), high solar insolation (4.5 – 6.5 kWh/m²), 1,424km of coastal strip, and availability of good wind regime (> 4 m/s wind speed), they are marginally contributing to the production of commercial energy.  Ongoing exploration work also reveals that the country has an active system of petroleum and uranium.  On the other hand, after commissioning the 229km natural gas pipeline from SongoSongo Island to Dar es Salaam, there are efforts to ensure a wider application in electricity generation, households, automotive and industry.</p><p> </p><p>Due to existing environmental concerns, biomass resource is an attractive future energy for the world, Tanzania inclusive.  This calls for putting in place sustainable energy technologies, like gasification, for their harnessing.  The high temperature gasification (HTAG) of biomass is a candidate technology since it has shown to produce improved syngas quality in terms of gas heating value that has less tar.</p><p> </p><p>This work was therefore initiated in order to contribute to efforts on realizing a commercial application of biomass in Tanzania.  Particularly, the work aimed at establishing characteristic properties of selected biomass feedstock from Tanzania.  The characteristic properties are necessary input to thermochemical process designers and researchers.  Furthermore, since the properties are origin-specific, this will provide baseline data for technology transfer from north to south.  The characteristic properties that were established were chemical composition, and thermal degradation behaviour.  Furthermore, laboratory scale high temperature gasification of the biomasses was undertaken.</p><p> </p><p>Chemical composition characteristics was established to palm waste, coffee husks, cashew nut shells (CNS), rice husks and bran, bagasse, sisal waste, jatropha seeds, and mango stem.  Results showed that the oxygen content ranged from 27.40 to 42.70% where as that of carbon and hydrogen ranged from 35.60 to 56.90% and 4.50 to 7.50% respectively.  On the other hand, the elemental composition of nitrogen, sulphur and chlorine was marginal.  These properties are comparable to findings from other researchers.  Based on the results of thermal degradation characteristics, it was evident that the cashew nut shells (CNS) was the most reactive amongst the analyzed materials since during the devolatilization stage the first derivative TG (DTG) peak due to hemicellulose degradation reached (-5.52%/minute) compared palm stem whose first peak was -4.81%/minute.  DTG first peak for the remaining materials was indistinct.</p><p> </p><p>Results from the laboratory gasification experiments that were done to the coffee husks showed that gasification at higher temperature (900°C) had an overall higher gasification rate.  For instance, during the inert nitrogen condition, 7% of coffee husk remained for the case of 900°C whereas the residue mass for the gasification at 800 and 700°C was 10 and 17% respectively.  Steam injection to the biomass under high temperature gasification evolved the highest volumetric concentration of carbon monoxide.  The CO peak evolution at 900°C steam only was 23.47 vol. % CO whereas that at 700°C was 21.25 vol. % CO.  Comparatively, the CO peaks for cases without steam at 900°C and 2, 3, and 4% oxygen concentrations were 4.59, 5.93, and 5.63% respectively.  The reaction mechanism of coffee husks gasification was highly correlated to zero reaction order exhibiting apparent activation energy and the frequency factor 161 kJ/mol and 3.89x10⁴/minute respectively.</p> / QC 20100923

Tanzania has a characteristic developing economy, which is dependent on agricultural productivity.  About 90% of the total primary energy consumption of the country is from biomass.  Since the biomass is mostly consumed at the household level in form of wood fuel, it is marginally contributing to the commercial energy supply.  However, the country has abundant energy resources from hydro, biomass, natural gas, coal, uranium, solar, wind and geothermal.  Due to reasons that include the limited technological capacity, most of these resources have not received satisfactory harnessing.  For instance: out of the estimated 4.7GW macro hydro potential only 561MW have been developed; and none of the 650MW geothermal potential is being harnessed.  Furthermore, besides the huge potential of biomass (12 million tons of oil equivalent), natural gas (45 million cubic metres), coal (1,200 million tones), high solar insolation (4.5 – 6.5 kWh/m2), 1,424km of coastal strip, and availability of good wind regime (&gt; 4 m/s wind speed), they are marginally contributing to the production of commercial energy.  Ongoing exploration work also reveals that the country has an active system of petroleum and uranium.  On the other hand, after commissioning the 229km natural gas pipeline from SongoSongo Island to Dar es Salaam, there are efforts to ensure a wider application in electricity generation, households, automotive and industry.   Due to existing environmental concerns, biomass resource is an attractive future energy for the world, Tanzania inclusive.  This calls for putting in place sustainable energy technologies, like gasification, for their harnessing.  The high temperature gasification (HTAG) of biomass is a candidate technology since it has shown to produce improved syngas quality in terms of gas heating value that has less tar.   This work was therefore initiated in order to contribute to efforts on realizing a commercial application of biomass in Tanzania.  Particularly, the work aimed at establishing characteristic properties of selected biomass feedstock from Tanzania.  The characteristic properties are necessary input to thermochemical process designers and researchers.  Furthermore, since the properties are origin-specific, this will provide baseline data for technology transfer from north to south.  The characteristic properties that were established were chemical composition, and thermal degradation behaviour.  Furthermore, laboratory scale high temperature gasification of the biomasses was undertaken.   Chemical composition characteristics was established to palm waste, coffee husks, cashew nut shells (CNS), rice husks and bran, bagasse, sisal waste, jatropha seeds, and mango stem.  Results showed that the oxygen content ranged from 27.40 to 42.70% where as that of carbon and hydrogen ranged from 35.60 to 56.90% and 4.50 to 7.50% respectively.  On the other hand, the elemental composition of nitrogen, sulphur and chlorine was marginal.  These properties are comparable to findings from other researchers.  Based on the results of thermal degradation characteristics, it was evident that the cashew nut shells (CNS) was the most reactive amongst the analyzed materials since during the devolatilization stage the first derivative TG (DTG) peak due to hemicellulose degradation reached (-5.52%/minute) compared palm stem whose first peak was -4.81%/minute.  DTG first peak for the remaining materials was indistinct.   Results from the laboratory gasification experiments that were done to the coffee husks showed that gasification at higher temperature (900°C) had an overall higher gasification rate.  For instance, during the inert nitrogen condition, 7% of coffee husk remained for the case of 900°C whereas the residue mass for the gasification at 800 and 700°C was 10 and 17% respectively.  Steam injection to the biomass under high temperature gasification evolved the highest volumetric concentration of carbon monoxide.  The CO peak evolution at 900°C steam only was 23.47 vol. % CO whereas that at 700°C was 21.25 vol. % CO.  Comparatively, the CO peaks for cases without steam at 900°C and 2, 3, and 4% oxygen concentrations were 4.59, 5.93, and 5.63% respectively.  The reaction mechanism of coffee husks gasification was highly correlated to zero reaction order exhibiting apparent activation energy and the frequency factor 161 kJ/mol and 3.89x104/minute respectively. / QC 20100923

La double fonction absorption-photodégradation des composites CA-TiO2 vis-à-vis des polluants biorécalcitrants est une alternative prometteuse pour le traitement de l’eau par voie solaire. Dans ce travail, des composites CA-TiO2 sont élaborés suivants trois méthodes simples basées sur l’utilisation des biomasses trouvées dans la sous région ensoleillée de l’Afrique subsaharienne. Les charbons actifs (CA) obtenus après pyrolyse des biomasses développent une structure poreuse qui se modifie ensuite en fonction de la voie de fixation des nanoparticules TiO2 (NPs-TiO2) pour l’obtention des composites. Parmi les trois vois de fixation du TiO2, l’imprégnation du CA avec le sol de NPs-TiO2 préformées conduit à des matériaux (CAT.SX) avec du TiO2 déposé de façon homogène à la « surface externe » du CA. Cette microtexture permet un meilleur couplage des propriétés adsorption-photodégradation, favorables aux performances de dépollution évaluées à l’échelle de laboratoire sur des solutions de phénol à 100 mg.L-1. Le réseau pores/surface spécifique est moins développé sur les composites obtenus par fixation in situ des NPs-TiO2 sur du CA imprégné de gel de TiO2 (CAT.GX), ou par pyrolyse directe de biomasse pré-imprégnée de NPs-TiO2 (CAT.SBX) ; ce qui explique les performances de dépollution moins élevées enregistrées pour ces deux dernières familles de catalyseurs. Les cinétiques d’élimination du polluant obtenues après plusieurs cycles successifs d’utilisation des catalyseurs CAT.SX ont été correctement simulées avec un modèle dont le formalisme tient compte de la double fonctionnalité des catalyseurs. Ce modèle permet d’envisager le dimensionnement d’installations solaires en condition réelle d’utilisation de ces nouveaux catalyseurs en zones fortement ensoleillée / Adsorption/photodegradation dual property of AC-TiO2 composites materials towards biorefractory pollutants is a promising issue for solar water treatment. In this work, AC-TiO2 hybrid materials have been synthesized through 03 novel routes based on the conversion of typical biomasses, abundantly found in the subsaharian African sunny areas. Biomasses pyrolysis derived activated carbon (AC) developed a porous structure which is modified differently according to the method used to fix TiO2 nanoparticules (TiO2-NPs). AC impregnated with a sol containing TiO2-NPs suspension provides the derived composite material (CAT.SX) with TiO2-NPs regularly deposited at the “external surface”, leading to a good coupling of adsorption/photodegradation activities towards phenol elimination in 100 mg.L-1 polluted water, carried out on lab scale experiments. Pore/surface area network is less developed on composites obtained after in situ fixation of TiO2-NPs on TiO2 gel impregnated AC (CAT.GX), or obtained after direct pyrolysis of TiO2-NPs impregnated biomass (CAT.SBX) – which infers lesser decontamination performances for these two latter families of catalysts. Pollutant elimination kinetics curves depicted after recycling of CAT.SX over several running water treatment was simulated with a suitable mathematical model which takes into consideration the dual functionalities of the elaborated material. The established model is a promising attempt for future dimensioning of real solar water treatment plants, operating in sunny areas with the new composite catalysts.