[Stoves] Coal dust briquetting

[Crispin Pemberton-Pigott]

Millions!

I was attending a barn fire near my home in Cherrywood, Ontario about 1971 or so, and as my step-father had an aqualung, I took it over. The barn was so full of pyrolysis gases from the auto-ignited hay (haylage, they called it) that it was becoming impossible to fight the fire.  There was serious danger of suffocation if anyone tried to “open the barn” higher up because it would take time.  Clearing the fire required removing the pyrolyzing material by hand with pitchforks as the community members could toss it to the front end loader.

I used the aqualung to enter the building and walk over the top of the hay though the gases (which really stung the eyes I might add) and kicked out a board at the end of the barn creating a ventilation hole.  Air then entered the working space and the pyrolysis gases left the building through one end.

That was my first experience with auto-ignition of biomass.

Later, a farmer in Saskatchewan worked out how to get his manure pile to “cook” and by passing a coil of water-filled pipe under it, or buried in it, he heated his house for a whole winter.  So the challenge is not to prevent “self-cooking” but to control it in a useful manner.

Right Paul?

Crispin

++++++++

A question related to biomass waste parallel with coal - are there instances of auto-ignition in any biomass waste?>

N


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