[Gasification] mycoremediation of tarry water

Pete & Sheri spaco at baldwin-telecom.net
Mon Feb 4 12:51:02 CST 2013


I probably  have no business asking entering into this discussion since I am
neither a chemist nor a physicist, but---

Over the last several months I have been trying to learn the "truth" about
the dissociation of the water in my wood chips  into Hydrogen and oxygen.  I
had previously read someplace that it was a pretty simple process.  You just
heat water to somewhere above 350 degrees C and there you go.

  Well, lately I have become quite disconcerted as I have read that there
are so many other factors that can be involved, that it's anybody's guess as
to whether it will happen at all.   

Some of the variables:

Pressure

Temperature (obviously)

Residence time

Presence or absence of carbon and form of that carbon.  And, apparently, the
availability of carbon from other molecules.

And apparently, the list goes on and on.

 

So what is an ordinary human with a stratified downdraft gasifier to do to
reliably  pry enough hydrogen out of the process to make it worth doing?

 

Pete Stanaitis

----------------

 

 

From: Gasification [mailto:gasification-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On
Behalf Of doug.williams
Sent: Monday, February 04, 2013 11:26 AM
To: Arnt Karlsen; gasification at lists.bioenergylists.org
Subject: Re: [Gasification] mycoremediation of tarry water

 


Hi Arnt,

 

You ask:


> ..quick question: H2 needs how much longer dwell time than CO?

 

For many years I was locked into H2  formation as only a temperature
dependant disassociation, but this has been shown to be incorrect by the
continuous gas analysis we have been able to use for the development
programme in California. As we increased the output over a range of bed
depths, H2 dropped, while CO tended to increase. You could always find a
sweet spot for a chosen depth, but H2 formation lagged if you pulled harder.

 

If you increase the bed depths to increase the contact/dwell time, even by
say 25mm, the H2 will increase, but then so does bed resistances. Time taken
has to be nano seconds, but as you have discovered, a good sneeze can help
maintain the bed porosity(:-)

 

There are many ways to skin this cat, but the basics remain the same based
on the experience so far. It would be great if gas was only made at a fixed
output, then variations of every type could be controlled.

 

Doug Williams,

Fluidyne------

 

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