Transcript Biomass - Virtus Equipment

Björn Müller November 2013
 Based on the source of biomass, biofuels are classified broadly into two major
categories:
 First generation biofuels are derived from sources such as sugarcane, corn and
others. Sugars present in these biomass are fermented to produce bioethanol, an
alcohol fuel.
But to turn food based resources into biofuels is highly controversial
 Second generation biofuels on the other hand utilize non food based biomass
sources such as agriculture and municipal waste or it derives from energy crops
such as Miscanthus, Hemp, Bamboo or fast growing timber varieties. It mostly
consists of lignocellulosic biomass which is not edible and is a low value waste for
many industries.
 Wood is the oldest and remains until today the largest biomass energy source;
examples include forest residues (such as dead trees, branches and tree stumps),
yard clippings, wood chips and others.
 The best known byproduct in the agriculture is straw from corn cultivations as corn
is grown in most climate zones all over the globe as well. From all the corn species
rice and wheat are the 2 most important ones.
 One of the biggest newcomers of second generation biofuels in the tropical zones
of the globe today are the residues of the Palm Oil production the: PKS or Palm
Kernel Shell and the EFB or Empty Fruit Bunches. This is one typical example
where the demand for first generation fuels is driving up the availability of their
residues
 Then there are plenty of other byproducts from agricultural industries such as
Molasses from Sugar Cane, Stalks from Cotton growers, Husks of Coconuts, Corn,
Maize, Soybeans etc., Shells from all kind of Nuts, Seeds and Fruits
Straw：
Moisture
(%)
Calorific Value
(GJ/t)
Calorific Value
(kwh/kg)
Calorific Value
(kCal/kg)
Bulk Density
(kg/m3)
Yellow straw
15
14,4
4,00
3,440
80-125
Grey straw
15
15,0
4,17
3,586
100-135
Straw including corn
15
15,0
4,17
3,586
200-230
Canola/Rape Straw
15
15,0
4,17
3,586
100-130
Miscanthus or
Giant/King Grass
10
15,9
4,40
3,784
130-150
Straw Pellets
8
16,0
4,44
3,818
600
Grain (wheat,
barley...)
15
15,0
4,17
3,586
670-750
Rapeseed
9
24,6
6,83
5,874
700
Wood:
Moisture
(%)
Calorific Value
(GJ/t)
Calorific Value
(kwh/kg)
Calorific Value
(kCal/kg)
Bulk Density
(kg/m3)
Old Wood Chips
40
10,4
2,89
2,485
235
Fresh wood chips
55
7,2
2,00
1,720
310
Wet Saw Mill Dust
40
4,5
2,92
2,511
240
Dry Saw Mill Dust
20
15,2
4,22
3,629
175
Fresh Willow chips
50
8,0
2,21
1,900
280
Old Willow chips
30
12,2
3,38
2,906
200
Pine Bark
50
7,7
2,14
1,840
280
dry Saw Dust
20
15,2
4,2
3,612
160-175
Dry Beech Logs
20
14,7
4,08
3,509
400-450
Fresh Beech Logs
45
9,4
2,61
2,245
650
Wood Pellets
6
17,5
4,90
4,214
660
Others:
Moisture
(%)
Calorific Value
(GJ/t)
Calorific Value
(kwh/kg)
Calorific Value
(kCal/kg)
Bulk Density
(kg/m3)
MSW
30-40
9,0
2,50
2,150
Heavy Fuel Oil
42,7
11,86
10,200
840
Heavy Crude Oil
40,4
11,22
9,649
980
900
Used Oil
42,0
11,67
10,036
25,0-28,0
6,9-7,0
6,020
Natural Gas
39,0
10,83
9,314
Lignite/Brown Coal
18-20
5,1-5,5
4,588
Light Fuel Oil
34,2
9,5kwh/Itr
8,200kcal/Itr
Coal
10
Several factors to be looked at when going into biomass projects
 When turning biomass into energy it is mostly necessary that there’s a stable and
continuous supply of raw materials.
Same sources can be differently depending on the regions they grow and concepts
that work in one place might not do in another. For example rice straw: China is a
huge country with a large diversification of climates. In the North there are vast
Tundras that allow only one harvest per year while in the tropical South the rice can
be planted the whole year round and even at a higher yield per hectare.
So when trying to turn the straw into energy the logistical challenges are very
different in each location and the cost to get the material to site are not
comparable.
 But when looking at the rice husk in each place the conditions are almost the same
as the husking is mostly done in the mill and it comes there for “free” with the rice
itself. So dealing with industrial residues is often preferable as they occur in one
place at mostly stable rates the whole year round.
 After fixing the source it is important to have steady consumers that take the
product you intend to make.
 Here 2 factors are to be thought of most: The distance to the consumer and what
form of product the customer can handle and use.
Ideally in our sample above right next to the rice mill you have a consumer e.g. a
cement factory that can burn the husks as they are. Which is frankly speaking not
so ideal for Crushmaster!!
But if that cement factory also wants to make use of the straw and/or if it’s far away
then we have to look at the infrastructure (does the cost saving and reduction of the
carbon footprint justify the use of alternative fuels) and the form we deliver.
Generally a cement kiln needs 2 kinds of fuel; a solid form where the gravel enters
the kiln (calciner) and an fast combustible form at the end (main burner).
 To stick with my sample this cement factory could use 3 types of fuel:
 The husks themselves if the location does allow that
 Pellets from either straw or husks for the main burner as they easily combust
 Or Briquettes made from straw or husks for the calciner as a slower burning fuel
 The more energy you need to make your product the smaller you margin gets.
 The simplest way to turn biomass in a usable form to generate energy is to produce
a homogenous product that can be burned directly. This is often the case for wood
chips or large husks such as coconut. Off cuts, stumps or full husks are normally too
big and to various in size and shape to be burned without treatment as most
combustion equipment have fully automated feeders.
In such case a one step size reduction is usually enough
 But often the residues we have to handle are fresh and thus have pretty high
moisture contents (fresh wood about 40%, EFB up to 65%). In that case just
shredding is not enough and dryers are needed unless the boiler can accept high
levels of moisture. To cut the energy cost for drying they are normally heated with
the biomass that is on hand but that on the other side cuts the overall output!
 In case the user is not specified or the distances are too far then we need to look
into densification processes. Here we are normally talking of 2 ways:
Pelletizing or Briquetting
 The Briquetting is the most efficient way to densify biomass as it can handle larger
input materials. Also the dies are bigger and thus it requires less power to make
Briquettes.
But industrial Briquettes cannot be handled by all boilers and the marketing is
more difficult.
Commercial Briquettes are highly standardized in Europe and the US but going to
all the procedures required can be a pain.
 Moisture requirements for making Briquettes are not that strict. 5-15% are ok, in
some cases up to 20%.
 Pellets are products that can be sold widely and their marketing is rather easy.
Many industrial boilers can handle Pellets and the numbers of homes using pellets
is growing steadily.
 Pelletizing requires more energy for each step. As the pellet diameters are usually
small (if sold in the EU they are 6mm or 8mm, for industrial use in Asia they are
max. 12mm) the input material needs to be ground down to a size that is for soft
materials about the same as the die diameter and for hard material about 60-70%
of the die diameter.
Further the moisture range for Pelletizing is pretty narrow, input material should be
at 10-12%.
And thirdly the Pelletizing process requires more power as the material has to pass
to relatively small die holes.
 Compared to Briquetting the power consumption for Material Preparation
(Shredding/Grinding) and the Pelletizing itself is about 60-80% higher.
Models and their use
 For the Shredding process Crushmaster offers 3 machine series.
 T-series (Zerma’s ZBS) for small scale joineries covering a range from 50-200kg/h
 Q-series (Zerma’s ZWS) for small, medium and large recycling operations at rates
from 200kg/h up to 7-8t/h.
 P-series (Zerma’s ZXS) for industrial scale recycling operations up to 20t/h
 For the granulating of biomass for chip sizes below 20mm Crushmaster offers 2
lines of machines
 K-series (Zerma’s GSE diameters 500 and 700) for small applications and
applications where the input material is soft or has been pre-shred covering rates
from 300kg/h up to 3t/h
 H-series (Zerma’s complete GSH series) for all applications where solid pieces
need to be ground down to small chip sizes in one step up to large industrial scale
operations. Further they can be used in a 2 step operation where fine chips are
needed at a high rate.
 For the compressing of biomass Crushmaster offers 2 own machine types
 U50-U70 series are hydraulic briquette presses which we have produce for Amis
for several years. The type number equals the briquette diameter of each type
(50,60 and 70mm) and they cover a range from 80-150kg/h as single version. We
also can built those as “Twin” versions which means we have 2 compressing units
on one storage silo and then the rates are double.
 U-75 is a mechanical briquette press that is under construction right now. Here the
compression is done through a piston that is actuated from a crank shaft. The crank
shaft driven via v-belts from an electrical motor and has large fly wheels mounted
on each end to overcome the pulsating workload.
 Crushmaster decided not to make Pelletizers for several reasons, one of it is that
there are too many players in this market already.
Yet we have contacts to several Pellet Mill manufacturers, German and Chinese. So
if a project includes the complete process from raw material to pellet we will join
with them but will not market their products under our brand.
 Another big part in most of the projects is the drying and also here we decided that
we will stay away from. One reason is that those dryers are usually very large and
shipping them from China doesn’t make sense and secondly we are not specialized
in that and we are afraid the learning curve would be too long!!
 Aside from further developing the machines we have and adding new types to
them we are also looking into new fields
 One very interesting field is the so called Torrefaction. This is a kind of roasting
process that turns any kind of biomass into bio coal (NOT charcoal).
During this process the material looses about 10% of its energy content but the
overall energy density increases by 70%. The result is a homogenous fuel with the
same properties non regarding its origin. It is further very easy to grind into
smaller sizes and it is highly hydrophobic. This means it can be stored outside as it
will not absorb water and it will not deteriorate during long distance transportation
under wet or humid conditions. As the material is completely dry and free of micro
organism there’s also zero risk of self ignition.
We think that this process is a solution for many problems of the South East Asian
area as here is plenty of biomass on hand but the markets are limited. So to enable
this area to conquer bigger markets its products have to be modified so they can
withstand long distance transportation and high humidity conditions.
If you want to get more information about any processes or
machines described in this presentation please feel free to
contact me!