[Stoves] Coconut husks as TLUD fuel

Anand Karve adkarve at gmail.com
Wed Dec 7 00:43:58 CST 2016


Dear Paul,
it seems that the web page is being reorganized. I have asked Priya to send
the relevant video or its link to you.
The NGO who are converting the coconut husk into char briquettes operates
on a hill, which belongs to the Department of Forests. All the hills around
Pune City had been denuded of their forest cover. This particular NGO
calling itself "Green Hills" is attempting to plant trees on these hills.
The trees which they have planted, shed their leaves in the post-monsoon
season. Unsocial elements set the leaf litter on fire, which also damages
the trees. Therefore, we demonstrated our charring process to the trustees
of this NGO who started using our kiln to convert the dry leaves into
charcoal. An elected member of the city council came to know about it and
persuaded the management of this NGO to make charcoal from coconut husk.
They agreed to do so. The coconut shells are delivered to them together
with the husk. The shells are split open into two halves with the help of a
machete. The halved shells are spread out on the hill side for drying and
after drying, they are subjected to pyrolysis in our kiln. The pyrolysis
gas is burned to produce a clean, smokeless flame, and when the kiln stops
emitting flames, the operator removes the charcoal formed in the kiln and
dowses it with water.  The wet char is then passed on to teams operating
the briquetting machines. The briquettes are again dried under the sun for
four days, before packing and selling them. This charcoal has about 20% ash
and it is as good as foundry grade coke.
The work described above has currently come to a stand still because of a
quarrel among the labourers. One of them was killed and the others have
stopped reporting for work.
Yours
A.D.Karve

***
Dr. A.D. Karve

Chairman, Samuchit Enviro Tech Pvt Ltd (www.samuchit.com)

Trustee & Founder President, Appropriate Rural Technology Institute (ARTI)

On Tue, Dec 6, 2016 at 7:34 PM, Paul Anderson <psanders at ilstu.edu> wrote:

> A.D.,
>
> Thanks for pointing that out.   I remember your kiln approach but had
> forgotten about its use with conconut husks.
>
> I went to your website and entered the U-Tube button, but I did not find
> the specific one you mention.   Please send a specific link.
>
> Also, please send more details about the actual operations for the drying
> and charring of the fresh husks.
>
> Paul
>
> Doc  /  Dr TLUD  /  Prof. Paul S. Anderson, PhD
> Email:  psanders at ilstu.edu
> Skype:   paultlud    Phone: +1-309-452-7072
> Website:  www.drtlud.com
>
> On 12/6/2016 1:53 AM, Anand Karve wrote:
>
> Dear Paul,
> I think that I had already reported that we had developed a kiln (based on
> the same principle as our Sampada Stove, which is basically TLUD) for
> making charcoal from agricultural waste. See our web site www.samuchit.com.
> It has a button for U-Tube, which would activate videos of various
> technologies developed by us, including the charring kiln. The city, where
> I live, generates daily about 30 tons (fresh weight) of coconut husk. An
> NGO gets this husk delivered to them free of transport cost. They dry the
> husk, and using our kilns and briquette extruders, this organisation makes
> char briquettes, which are used as smokeless cooking fuel.
> Yours
> A.D.Karve
>
> ***
> Dr. A.D. Karve
>
> Chairman, Samuchit Enviro Tech Pvt Ltd (www.samuchit.com)
>
> Trustee & Founder President, Appropriate Rural Technology Institute (ARTI)
>
> On Mon, Dec 5, 2016 at 8:30 PM, Paul Anderson <psanders at ilstu.edu> wrote:
>
>> Dear Mangolazi,   (and especially all Stovers who live in areas where
>> coconuts grow.)
>> Also sending to the Biochar Listserv because of biochar production
>> discussion.
>>
>> Great to hear of your experiences with coconut husks!!
>>
>> Many of us (including myself) have tried to use coconut husks as fuel in
>> TLUDs (or other stove types).  I believe that you have just reported more
>> success than anyone else, but perhaps others can correct me about that.
>>
>> What you describe is "typical".  But you have allowed the husks to
>> smoulder more, giving smoke that does not burn, or burns poorly.  AND you
>> report that after allowing that to happen, that you have "some good
>> biochar" (which I hope can be analyzed someday to confirm your
>> judgement.).
>>
>> AND you report some minor use of the heat.
>>
>> Can we assume that your two photos are taken during the early stage while
>> there are still fronds or perhaps even diesel fuel being burned?  I would
>> like to know more about your smokiness.
>>
>> You have the advantage of living in an area that produces coconuts and
>> the husks are plentiful.   Please continue your efforts.   They are very
>> important, considering the quantities of husks around the world and the
>> need for biochar in the tropics.
>>
>> Please consider doing some experiments and reporting back about your
>> results.
>>
>> 1.  You wrote:
>>
>> but it gets smoky once the only the husks are burning.
>>
>> Please try with a mixture of fronds in with the husks all the way through
>> the barrel of fuel.   Do this with known (approximate) percentages of
>> fronds (by weight or simply by volume).   Is 20% fronds functional?   Maybe
>> 40% fronds?  And confirm that 100% or 80% fronds will pyrolyze cleanly
>> (with combustible smoke).  I do not know of anyone who has done this.
>>
>> Most of the fuel consists of semi-dry brown-green husks
>>
>> Here you can repeat experiments with husks with various degrees of
>> dryness.  If with reasonable success with "mostly dried" or "highly dried"
>> or with some amount of "semi-dry brown-green husks", then that is further
>> progress.  YOU get to make up whatever classification system seems to
>> describe "dryness."   You can even "oven dry" some husks.
>>
>> Also, when you have determined something useful about dryness, we can
>> discuss having a "dryer" device that will use the heat from the TLUD
>> barrels to do the drying of the future batches of husks.
>>
>> Objectives:
>> A.  Produce biochar
>> B.  Elimimate (remove or dispose of) piles of discarded husks.
>> C.  Elimimate (stop) the rotting and off-gassing of methane and CO2 from
>> the discarded husks.
>> D.  Everntually claim carbon credits for the A and C above.
>> E.  Ultimately find a way to have useful heat while doing A through D
>> above.
>>
>> I am almost finished (need another week?) with a document about making
>> conveniently simple barrel-size TLUDs in a style that I personally like.
>> I will send it to you (Mangolazi) as a separate message.  Soon it will be
>> on my website and announced to the Listservs.
>>
>> We all look forward to more info about your work.   Also please tell us
>> about yourself, location, employment, goals, family, etc.
>>
>> Paul
>>
>> Doc  /  Dr TLUD  /  Prof. Paul S. Anderson, PhD
>> Email:  psanders at ilstu.edu
>> Skype:   paultlud    Phone: +1-309-452-7072
>> Website:  www.drtlud.com
>>
>> On 12/4/2016 10:23 PM, Mangolazi wrote:
>>
>> Hi stovers,
>>
>> I've been making some big TLUDs to turn farm waste into biochar as well as using the heat for cooking. I'm using oil drums with a chimney made from stacked paint cans; the fuel consists of dried coconut husks (not copra or coconut shells) and chopped coconut fronds. I pack the fuel into the drum as tightly as possible and light it off with diesel-soaked coconut fronds on top.
>>
>> Has anyone used these items as TLUD fuel for cooking or heating? I find the mixture burns cleanly at first, thanks to the quick and furious burn from the diesel and fronds, but it gets smoky once the only the husks are burning. Most of the fuel consists of semi-dry brown-green husks because it takes a long time for husks to dry down to a uniform dark brown color. I can get some good biochar after a 1.5-hour burn.
>>
>> My cooking attempts are limited to putting a small pot on the TLUD lid for simmering. It would also be possible to wrap copper tubing around the oil drum as a heat exchanger to heat water. In coastal Malaysia, coconut husks are usually left to very slowly break down into compost; it would be interesting to use it to replace LPG for simmering and as a heat source for small village enterprises.
>>
>>
>>
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