Supercritical Water Gasification of Eucalyptus Wood Chips Using NiFe₂O₄ as a Catalyst

¹ Interdisciplinary Center of Energy and Environmental (CIENAM), Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, Brazil
² European Bioenergy Research Institute, Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry, Aston University, Birmingham, England
³ Energy Engineering, Federal University of Reconcavo of Bahia (UFRB), Feira de Santana, Brazil
⁴ Chemical Engineering, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, England
⁵ Chemical Institute, Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, Brazil
⁶ Chemical Engineering, Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, Brazil

Abstract

In this work, the supercritical water gasification of eucalyptus wood chips has been investigated in relation to reaction temperature and presence of catalyst. Experiments were performed in a batch reactor at 450 ºC and 500 ºC with two different feed concentrations. This work wanted to evaluate mainly the gases were formed during the reactions. The gas products were analysed by gas chromatography. According to the results, it was found that eucalyptus wood chips reacted to form mainly H₂, CH₄ gases with little yield of CO₂. Increasing the reaction temperature beyond 500 ºC led to the increasing production of both CH₄ (around 31.1 mol%) and H₂ (up to 38 mol%) gases and the liquid sample and solid residue have decreased. Generally, this work suggests that the SCWG has improved significantly the production of H₂ but more experiments still necessary to verify the effects of other experimental parameters and to characterise the liquid sample and solid residue.