Investigation of Biomass Integrated Air Gasification Regenerative Gas Turbine Power Plants

Momin Elhadi Abdalla, Salah Ahmed Abdalla, Syed Ali Ammar Taqvi, Salman Raza Naqvi and Wei-Hsin Chen
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Momin Elhadi Abdalla: Chemical Engineering Department, University of Khartoum, Khartoum 11111, Sudan
Salah Ahmed Abdalla: Energy Research Centre, University of Khartoum, Khartoum 11115, Sudan
Syed Ali Ammar Taqvi: Department of Chemical Engineering, NED University of Engineering & Technology, Karachi 75270, Pakistan
Salman Raza Naqvi: School of Chemical & Materials Engineering, National University of Sciences & Technology, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan
Wei-Hsin Chen: Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan

Energies, 2022, vol. 15, issue 3, 1-18

Abstract: The results show that Wood Chips of Acacia Nilotica trees available in Sudan lands can be successfully used in the gasification process and, on the same basis, as a bio-renewable energy resource. Simulation models were used to characterize the air gasification process integrated with a Regenerative Gas Turbine Unit. The results revealed that at a moisture content of 12%, gasification temperature of 1500 K, pressure of 20 bar, and air-like gasification medium, the biomass gasifier’s flow rate is higher at higher syngas rates. The results verified that there is an optimum ER for each syngas rate, in which the slow growth of the ER revealed the maximum gasifier biomass flow rate. For ER growth at lower levels, the specific fuel consumption (SFC) of the RGT Unit declines sharply from the maximum value reached at 0.27 kg/kW·h at an ER of 5% to the minimum value reached at 0.80 kg/kW·h at an ER of 25% for the lowest gasification temperature of 1000 K. Moreover, ER growths at low levels have a significant effect on the RGT plant’s performance, leading to increased RGT thermal efficiency. The increase in the biomass moisture content led to a sharp decrease in the RGT thermal efficiency. The RGT thermal efficiency remains high at higher gasification pressure. The results revealed that the syngas lower heating value remains high at lower produced syngas rates. At the optimum ER, the H 2 mole fraction depicted a value of 1.25%, 0.85% of CO, and 10.50% of CH 4 for a lower heating value of 38 MJ/kg syngas. It is shown that the gasification air entered into the gasifier decreases amid the increase in the biomass moisture content. At different syngas rates (3–10 kg/s) and optimum ER, the results predicted that the Wood Chip biomass flow rates decrease when the gasifier efficiency increases. The simulation model revealed that ER growths at lower levels have a significant effect on increasing the power of the RGT plant.

Keywords: Acacia Nilotica; air gasification; syngas; equivalence ratio; regenerative; gas turbine (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: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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