Restricted accessResearch articleFirst published online 2025
Three-dimensional CFD simulation of co-gasification of biomass and plastic wastes (SRF) in a bubbling fluidized bed with detailed kinetic chemical model
In this study, a three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model using multiphase particle-in-cell (MP-PIC) method with large eddy simulation (LES) was developed to investigate the characteristics of the co-gasification of densified wood pellets (WP) and rice husk pellets (RHP) with SRF in a bubbling fluidized bed reactor. ER reduction from 0.30 to 0.10 resulted in a decrease in specific gas yield per total feed from 1.20 g/gtotal to 0.96 g/gtotal and from 1.20 g/gtotal to 0.67 g/gtotal during SRF/WP and SRF/RHP co-gasification, respectively. Reducing ER during SRF/WP co-gasification allows to increase C2–C3 HCs yield reaching 0.33 g/gsrf (0.15 g/gtotal) at ER = 0.15, 0.556 kg/h SRF, and 0.693 kg/h WP. Carbon conversion efficiency (CCE) and cold gas efficiency (CGE) at the same conditions reduced to 83% and 74%, respectively. Co-gasification of 0.667 kg/h SRF and 2.040 kg/h RHP allowed to reach 0.28 g/gsrf (0.07 g/gtotal) C2–C3 HCs yield, but drastically reducing CCE and CGE to 71% and 46%, respectively. SRF/WP co-gasification is suggested for low cost C2–C3 HCs recovery from SRF with coproduction of syngas retaining 48% to 57% of initial LHV, meaning that SRF/RHP co-gasification is more suitable for syngas production.
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