U. P. B. Sci. Bull., Series C, Vol. 69, No.

4, 2007 ISSN 1454-234x

ENERGY PERFORMANCE OF THE BIOMASS

GASIFICATION PROCESS

Paolo BAGGIO1, Marco BARATIERI2*, Maurizio GRIGIANTE3

In this paper the biomass gasification process has been analyzed taking into
account the thermodynamic constraints and considering the inherent limits of some
possible small-scale processes. A multiphase thermodynamic equilibrium approach
has been used to estimate the gas composition and the yield of char for partial
oxidation and steam gasification. To obtain a reliable estimate of the thermal
efficiency of a real process, a global analysis taking into account the whole balance
of plant has been performed, supplementing the chemical equilibrium
thermodynamic analysis used for the reacting stages with an evaluation of the
enthalpy and exergy fluxes arising from the other plant components.

Keywords: biomass, gasification, cogeneration.

1. Introduction

The renewed interest in the gas production technologies arises from the
opportunity of using biomass as feedstock, i.e. a potential substitute for fossil
fuels. In this context, one of the most important issues the researchers are focusing
on is the exploitation of this renewable energy source by means of sustainable
processes and power generation technologies, in order to achieve environmental
compatible solutions that can satisfy the increasing power demand. In particular
the utilization of synthesis gases at low calorific values (LCV gas) in traditional
internal combustion (IC) gas engines (Otto or Diesel cycles) is an interesting
option, given the high performances reached by this type of power generators. In
this paper it has been considered a typical cogeneration set for combined heat and
power (CHP) production, based on a quite simple IC gas engine plant
configuration, suitable for small-scale stationary applications.

2. Layout description

The syngas production section consists of a fixed bed gasification reactor

heated by a burner. The gasification process is endothermic, as it is carried out
with water steam as gasifying agent (steam gasification) and the heat necessary to

1
Full Prof., Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Italy
2
Res. fellow, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Italy(*Corresponding author)
3
Ass. Prof., Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Italy

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70 Paolo Baggio, Marco Baratieri, Maurizio Grigiante

sustain the reactions and to produce the water steam (i.e. the gasifying agent) is
supplied by the coupled burner in which a fraction of the produced syngas is
oxidized. For the thermochemical conversion process spruce sawdust has been
chosen as feedstock, characterized by the following [1]: ultimate analysis (mass
fractions, dry ash free basis) 51.58%C, 5.90%H, 42.43%O, 0.08%N, 0.01%S;
moisture (mass fractions, wet basis) 8.25%; ash (mass fractions, wet basis) 0.90%.
The considered plant configuration (see par. 4) represents a simple syngas
utilization in an internal combustion gas engine. The produced synthesis gas is
piped through a clean-up section to the engine, in order to produce electrical
energy. The flue gas from the coupled burner and the exhaust gas from the engine
are also subjected to a clean-up process and then piped to the chimney after being
heated in order to reach the desired temperature. All the plant stages operate at
atmospheric pressure. In order to obtain combined heat and power (CHP)
production, thermal energy recovery is performed on the engine exhaust gases and
on the syngas stream (before entering the clean-up module). The presence of by-
products in the syngas makes it necessary to clean-up the gaseous flow before its
use by the power generation section. There are different syngas clean-up
processes, depending on the feedstock, on the thermal conversion process and on
the power generators demand. Internal combustion gas engines have the
advantage of higher tolerance to contaminants than gas turbines or fuel cells [2],
in particular the tar content can be up to 50-100 mg Nm-3 in the producer gas. The
usual gas purification arrangement for a biomass plant (wet system) has been
adopted for the syngas and the flue or exhaust gases clean-up, including a
cyclone, a bag filter and a scrubber [3,4,5]. In the simulations, the clean-up system
global energy consumption has been estimated to be 3×10-3 kWh Nm-3 (specific
value relevant the gas subjected to the purification treatment).
The produced syngas stream feeds a 290kWel internal combustion gas
engine (conventional alternative Otto cycle). The thermal and electrical
efficiencies have been assumed respectively at 38.9% and 46.7% and, for the
exhaust gas temperature, a value of 140°C has been chosen.
Table 1
Adopted parameters for the syngas utilization section
Plant unit Process parameter Value
IC gas engine Temperature syngas (in) 30°C
Temperature exhausts (out) 140%
ER, Equivalence ratio 1
Electrical power 286 kW
Thermal power 347 kW
Total displacement 16.6 lt
Thermal efficiency 46.7%
Electrical efficiency 38.9%

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 Energy performance of the biomass gasification process 71

These values, used in the simulations, are in agreement with the real life engine
performances (GE-Jenbacher, 2006 [6]) operating as CHP generation sets.
The syngas LHV suitable for IC gas engine utilizations can be assessed to
be in the range of 9 – 16 MJ Nm-3 that corresponds to methane volume
concentrations between 30% and 50%. Table 1 shows the adopted parameters and
the characteristics of the gas engine considered for the plant simulations.

3. Modeling

The reacting stages of the plant (gasifier, burner, engine) have been
modeled with a thermodynamic chemical equilibrium approach supplemented
with an evaluation of the energy fluxes arising from the other components needed
for the actual operation. To this purpose, a code written in Matlab environment
has been developed using the Cantera software library (a collection of object-
oriented software tools for problems involving chemical kinetics, thermodynamics
and transport phenomena [7]). The solver implemented in Cantera is a version of
the Villars-Cruise-Smith (VCS) algorithm (a well suited method to handle
multiphase problems), that finds the composition minimizing the total Gibbs free
energy of a mixture [8]. The NASA [9] and the GRI-MECH [10] databases have
been used to evaluate the thermodynamic properties of the chemical species
considered in the model. The applied procedure for solving the minimization
problem is based on the stoichiometric formulation, in which the closed-system
constraint is treated by means of the linearly independent stoichiometric equations
(1) so as to result in an unconstrained minimization problem

R
n = n 0 + ∑ν j ξ j (1)
j =1

where n0 is the initial composition vector, νj represents the stoichiometric

coefficients vector and ξj are the so called ‘reaction coordinates’.
The minimization procedure applied to the G function implies the
computation of its partial derivatives with respect to the reaction coordinates (2)
and gives the equilibrium condition (3)

 ∂G  N 
∂G   ∂ni 
  = ∑     (2)
 ∂ξ j   
 T , P,ξ k ≠ j i =1  ∂ni T , P, nk ≠ j  ∂ξ j ξ k ≠ j

∑ν ij µ i = 0 (3)
i

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72 Paolo Baggio, Marco Baratieri, Maurizio Grigiante

where ni represents the number of moles and µi is the chemical potential.

The VCS algorithm utilizes this procedure, and it is very useful when
dealing with only a few independent stoichiometric equations. Among the set of
states which satisfy the element mass balance, VCS algorithm finds the state with
the lowest total Gibbs free energy.
To estimate the yield of both the gaseous and solid phases, an improved
two-phase formulation of the model has been used. For the reaction products, 61
chemical species - 60 in the gaseous phase and 1 in the solid state (i.e. the graphite
allotropic form of carbon) - are taken into account. The chosen compounds are
composed of the C, H, O, N and S elements characterizing the biomass. The
calculated yield of solid carbon can be used as an estimate of the actual char and
tar residue of the thermal conversion process.

4. Results

In order to assess the syngas quality and to reach high conversion

efficiencies, the steam gasification process has been investigated varying both the
SC (i.e. steam to carbon) ratio and the conversion temperature. First of all the
carbon conversion efficiency (char production as mass fraction) and the syngas
molar concentrations of hydrogen, methane and carbon monoxide (as they
represent the gaseous species of higher heating value) have been considered.
Figure 1 shows that there is complete carbon conversion (no solid carbon
production) at every considered gasification temperature for SC greater than 0.8;
this threshold decrease to SC = 0.5 for temperature greater than 700°C. Both
hydrogen and carbon monoxide concentrations have a decreasing trend with
growing SC: in fact the greater the steam supplied to the process, the greater the
conversion of H2 into H2O and of CO into CO2. Methane concentration presents
the same behavior with SC and, furthermore, the greater the process temperature,
the lower its production according to the reforming equilibrium reactions.
The balance of plant has been carried out estimating the mass and energy
fluxes needed to generate the desired electrical and thermal power (290 kWel,
350kWth) and to provide the heat and the electricity necessary for the internal
consumptions (gasification reactions enthalpy, clean-up energy demand, fume
heating). Figure 2 shows the mass balance and points out the temperatures
reached by the different streams through the plant, while figure 3 describes the
energy flow chart of the plant.
The gasification temperature (750°C) and the SC ratio (0.75) have been
chosen by means of an optimization procedure (see par 4.3), while the burner
temperature (903°) and equivalence ratio (ER = 1.2) have been computed so that
the burner flue gas enthalpy can be exploited to sustain the gasification reactions.
For this purpose, it has been adopted a tubular stainless steel reactor (0.25m

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 Energy performance of the biomass gasification process 73

internal diameter, 5mm wall thickness) surrounded by an external cylindrical steel

jacket (0.32m internal diameter), in which flows the hot flue gas from the coupled
burner. The model computes the flue gas mass flow (0.52m3s-1) and its average
speed on the jacket cross-section (6ms-1). Then, once the geometry of the tubes
and the biomass bulk density (192kg m-3) have been chosen, and also the
residence time (of the feedstock in the reactor) has been assumed (1200s), it is
possible to calculate the required reactor length (1.7m).
As mentioned above, the biomass energy content (PIN (BIOMASS)) is exploited
both for generating the heat and the steam necessary to the gasification stage
(PSYNG (RIC)) and for fueling the IC engine (PSYNG (ENG)). Moreover, all the produced
syngas is subjected to a recovering process at the gasifier outlet (750-140°C) in
order to obtain thermal power (PRECOV) available for external consumers (PNET RECOV)
and for heating the fume before the chimney (PHEATING).

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74 Paolo Baggio, Marco Baratieri, Maurizio Grigiante

Figure 1. Char and syngas characterization.

750°C 140°C 140°C 30°C

Clean-up
Syngas Heat Syngas, eng
278.9 kg/h recover Water 154.5 kg/h
24.6 kg/h
Syngas, ric
99.8 kg/h Air
581.5 kg/h
Steam Air
Gasifier Burner
95.2 kg/h 423.6 kg/h
Thermal
Biomass 903°C power
185.6 kg/h 140°C 347 kW
Gas Engine
750°C Electrical
140°C
power
Flue gas Exhaust gas 286 kW
Ash
523.4 kg/h 736.0 kg/h
1.9 kg/h

30°C 140°C
Clean-up
Fume
1088.5 kg/h
Water
170.9 kg/h Heating

Figure 2. Plant layout and mass fluxes.

PIN (BIOMASS) PSYNG (TOT) PSYNG (ENG)

GASIFIER
(100%)

PCLEAN
(0.4%)
PASH PREACT PRECOV
(0.7%) PVAP PEL
(33.6%)
IC
ENGINE
PTH
BURNER PSYNG (RIC)
(40.8%)

PFLUE PEXHAUST

PNET RECOV
PHEATING
(6.6%)

PFUME PLOSS
(0.9%) (17%)

Figure 3. Energy fluxes.

The global plant efficiency, assessed at 81% (4), as been computed as the
sum of the total generated power by means of the gas engine (PEL and PTH), plus the
net heat recovered from the syngas stream (PNET RECOV), minus the electric internal
consumptions (PCLEAN).

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 Energy performance of the biomass gasification process 75

PEL + PTH + PNET ⋅RECOV − PCLEAN

η PLANT = (4)
PIN (BIOMASS )
The major fraction of the energy loss (PLOSS - 17% of the inlet power) has
been estimated to be mainly due to the latent water heat exiting the system from
the clean-up stages: in fact, existing scrubbing technologies do not allow for the
recovering of this energy fraction, causing a significant loss for the whole system.
Furthermore, the latent heat has not been taken into account in the recovery of the
available thermal energy from the exhaust gases (considered at 140°C at the plant
chimney), since the lower heating value has been considered as inlet power for the
feedstock. The other losses are relevant to the ash fraction (PASH – 0.7%) and the
combustion products stream (PFUME – 0.9%) exiting the system.
The best operating conditions have been estimated by means of an
optimization procedure. It consists in evaluating the dry syngas lower heating
value (LHV - dry basis) and the global plant efficiency, varying the SC ratio and
the gasification temperature and choosing the optimum values. In figure 4a it is
possible to observe a decrease of the syngas LHV both for increasing SC values
(10.5 ÷ 7.5 MJ Nm-3) and with temperature greater than 700°C. In this diagram,
SC values between 0.5 and 1 a give syngas LHVs in agreement with the engine
requirements (9-10 MJ Nm-3) for all the tested temperatures. On the other hand
the global efficiency analysis (figure 4b) gives 1.5 ÷ 2.2 SC as optimum values
and narrows the desired temperature range at values greater than 700°C, where the
efficiency tends to increase (83% maximum value).
a) b) (ηPLANT)

Figure 4. Optimization procedure results

Thus, it is worth to assume a SC ratio of 0.5 and a temperature of 750°C,

accepting a design value of the global efficiency (81%), slightly lower than the

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76 Paolo Baggio, Marco Baratieri, Maurizio Grigiante

maximum reachable one, in order to achieve the syngas energy content necessary
for the engine (9.4MJ Nm-3). Furthermore, the chosen process parameters allow to
obtain an high-quality syngas, characterized by low volume concentrations of the
considered pollutants (H2S = 57.7ppmv, NH3 = 3.1ppmv on a wet basis).

6. Conclusions

An equilibrium simulation of a small-scale biomass gasification plant has

been performed in order to assess the global efficiency and the influence of the
process parameters on the performance of the whole system. First of all, a
significant electrical efficiency (33.6%) has been estimated, that is even better
than those reached by some traditional fossil-fuel plants; in particular, it has been
quantified a biomass amount of 1.5 kg of spruce sawdust in order to produce 1
kWh of electric energy. The considered plant configuration allows the recovery of
a remarkable thermal energy fraction released at high temperatures on the syngas
line and at the burner exhaust outlet, which, if exploited, makes it possible to
reach a theoretical global energy efficiency of 81%. Moreover, considering the
chosen plant size, it seems reasonable to exploit the produced thermal power at
local scale, avoiding the installation of an extended and expensive district heating
network. As a conclusion, this solution can be particularly suitable for distributed
energy production, especially in small towns situated in rural zones, where there is
often available a large quantity of biomass waste (e.g. from wood industry).

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