Biocrude Production from Hydrothermal Liquefaction of Chlorella: Thermodynamic Modelling and Reactor Design

Lili Qian, Jun Ni, Zhiyang Xu, Bin Yu, Shuang Wang, Heng Gu and Dong Xiang
Additional contact information
Lili Qian: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang 212013, China
Jun Ni: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang 212013, China
Zhiyang Xu: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang 212013, China
Bin Yu: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang 212013, China
Shuang Wang: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang 212013, China
Heng Gu: School of Mechanical Engineering, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang 212013, China
Dong Xiang: College of Chemistry & Chemical Engineering, Anhui University, Hefei 230601, China

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 20, 1-9

Abstract: Hydrothermal liquefaction can directly and efficiently convert wet biomass into biocrude with a high heating value. We developed a continuous hydrothermal liquefaction model via Aspen Plus to explore the effects of moisture content of Chlorella , reaction pressure and temperature on thermodynamic equilibrium yields, and energy recoveries of biocrude. We also compared the simulated biocrude yield and energy recoveries with experiment values in literature. Furthermore, vertical and horizontal transportation characteristics of insoluble solids in Chlorella were analyzed to determine the critical diameters that could avoid the plugging of the reactor at different flow rates. The results showed that the optimum moisture content, reaction pressure, and reaction temperature were 70–90 wt%, 20 MPa, and 250–350 °C, respectively. At a thermodynamic equilibrium state, the yield and the energy recovery of biocrude could be higher than 56 wt% and 96%, respectively. When the capacity of the hydrothermal liquefaction system changed from 100 to 1000 kg·h ?1 , the critical diameter of the reactor increased from 9 to 25 mm.

Keywords: hydrothermal liquefaction; biocrude; Aspen Plus; critical diameter (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/20/6602/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/20/6602/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:14:y:2021:i:20:p:6602-:d:655333

Access Statistics for this article

Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao

More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().