In order to meet growing demands for alternatives to fossil fuels, biomass pyrolysis is
a method that has been explored in depth as a method to develop new liquid fuels. Fast
pyrolysis is a subtype of pyrolysis reaction in which a specimen is heated at rates in
excess of 10C/s in an oxygen-free environment, causing the specimen to thermally
degrade and release a volatile bio-oil. The goal of this thesis is to design and commission
a novel reactor for the continuous isothermal fast pyrolysis of ground biomass. The
reactor design utilizes a vibrating plate heated to a set pyrolysis temperature. Analytical
and empirically-derived vibratory transport models are presented for ground Pinus taeda
(loblolly pine) to assist in setting the desired pyrolysis reaction time. A condenser system
was designed to rapidly evacuate and chill the volatiles to prevent tar formation and
secondary reactions. Commissioning tests were run at a pair of temperatures and biomass
residence times to determine the degree of agreement between the reactor yields and
two-component volatile formation data derived from batch fast pyrolysis of Pinus taeda.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:GATECH/oai:smartech.gatech.edu:1853/47544 |
| Date | 14 January 2013 |
| Creators | Glauber, Samuel Melville |
| Publisher | Georgia Institute of Technology |
| Source Sets | Georgia Tech Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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