Proceedings of the
Second International Energy 2030 Conference,
November 4-5, 2008, Abu Dhabi, U.A.E.
Kinetic Study of High Temperature Steam Gasification of Biomass
Rafal Buczynski
University of Maryland, USA
Kriengsak Sangtong-Ngam
University of Maryland, USA
Islam Ahmed
University of Maryland, USA
Jakub Gmurczyk
University of Maryland, USA
Ashwani K. Gupta
University of Maryland, USA
Abstract
Gasification is also a flexible process of converting carbon and volatile matters in biomass into a fuel
gas consisting of mainly gaseous products such as hydrogen, carbon monoxide, methane and carbon
monoxide with the use of some gasifying agent. The exact composition of the gases produced depends on
the gasifying agent and the operational conditions. In order to achieve the high hydrogen yield, it is
necessary to understand the chemical kinetics of gasification. This reaction can occur under controlled
conditions of both temperature and pressure at sufficient residence time. The main reactions that occur
during the gasification process are partial combustion reactions and gasification reactions. The partial
combustion reactions react with free oxygen and are essentially complete under gasification conditions.
These reactions are exothermic reaction and their roles are to give energy for the gasification reactions,
endothermic reactions. The biomass gasification consists of two important steps of (i) initial rapid
pyrolysis (devolatilization) to produce char, tar and gases, and (ii) subsequent gasification of the char
generated. The char consists of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, ash and a small amount of hetero-atoms such as
N and S. The char gasification step has much slower reaction rate when compared with the rapid pyrolysis
step. It is, therefore, considered as the controlling parameter for the overall conversion process. Most of
the char gasification data reported in the literature has been obtained from coal gasification process and
this is very different form the pyrolysis conditions. In this paper data has been obtained on the chemical
