-
Analytical Study Of A Small Scale Biomass Gasifier
CHAPTER ONE -- [Total Page(s) 2]
Page 2 of 2
-
-
-
Time spent by rural people in gathering and cooking with these fuels
involves hard work and drudgery, and is a diversion from other
economically useful activities. In 2009, about 1.4 billion people in the
world lived without electricity, and 2.7 billion relied on wood,
charcoal, and dung for home energy requirements (IEA, 2006). This lack
of access to modern energy technology limits income generation, blunts
efforts to escape poverty, affects people's health, and contributes to
global deforestation and climate change. Small-scale renewable energy
technologies and distributed energy options, such as onsite solar power
and improved cook-stoves, offer rural households modern energy services.
The
emergence of biomass as a credible source of alternative energy is fast
gaining global recognition and acknowledgement in the world today.
Attributing factors to its growth owe to the fact that its availability
is of no shortage as its supply is renewable coupled with the fact that
its application/utilization has minimal or significant detrimental
effects compared to the utilization of fossil fuel. Biomass is one of
the most plentiful and well utilized sources of renewable energy in the
world. According to the IEA, (2006) Biomass refers to organic matter
that has stored energy through the process of photosynthesis. It exists
in one form as plants and may be transferred through the food chain to
animal bodies and their wastes, all of which can be converted for
everyday human use through processes such as combustion, gasification
and pyrolysis which releases the carbon dioxide stored in the plant
material. Biomass is a renewable energy source not only because the
energy in it comes from the sun, but also because biomass can re-grow or
replenish over a relatively short period of time in comparison to the
hundreds of millions of years that it would take fossil fuels to form
through the process of photosynthesis.
Many of the biomass fuels used
today come in the form of wood products, dried vegetation, crop
residues, and aquatic plants. Biomass has become one of the most
commonly developed renewable sources of energy in the last two decades,
second only to hydropower in the generation of electricity. It is such a
widely utilized source of energy, probably due to its low cost and
indigenous nature, that it accounts for almost 15% of the world's total
energy supply and as much as 35% in developing countries, mostly for
cooking and heating (IEA, 2006).
Biomass power is carbon neutral
electricity generated from renewable organic waste that would otherwise
be dumped in landfills, openly burned, or left as fodder for forest
fires. When burned, the energy in biomass is released as heat. In
biomass power plants, wood waste or other waste are burned to produce
steam that runs a turbine to produce electrical energy, or that provides
heat to industries and homes. Fortunately, new technologies including
pollution controls and combustion engineering have advanced to the point
that any emissions from burning biomass in industrial facilities are
generally less than emissions produced when using fossil fuels (coal,
natural gas, oil) (IEA, 2006).
Gasification is a process that
converts organic or fossil fuel based carbonaceous materials into carbon
monoxide, hydrogen and carbon dioxide. This is achieved by reacting the
material at high temperatures (>700 °C), without combustion, with a
controlled amount of oxygen and/or steam. Gasification is not a new
technology, it was originally developed in the 1800s and is the
processes used to make town gas for lighting and cooking. Small scale
gasifier were also used to power internal combustion engine vehicles
during fuel shortages during the Second World War. It is a manufacturing
process that converts any material containing carbon such as coal,
petroleum coke, biomass or waste into synthesis gas (syngas). The
syngas can be burned in a turbine to produce electricity or further
processed to manufacture chemicals, fertilizers, liquid fuels,
substitute natural gas, or hydrogen. The percentage of biomass and waste
used as feedstock for gasification has been increasing in recent years.
Gasification is a flexible, reliable and clean energy technology that
can turn a variety of low-value feedstock into high value products,
help a country reduce its dependence on imported oil and natural gas,
and can provide a source of base-load electricity, substitute natural
gas, fuels, fertilizers, and chemicals needed for economic growth. These
amongst others are benefits biomass gasification. (IEA, 2006).
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
The
world is in a state of increasing energy demand accompanied by
decreasing availability of conventional energy sources, the bulk of
these energy sources being fossil fuel. The cost of fossil fuel,
inclusive of cost of procurement, processing and utilization when
considered alongside the deficient power generation from this energy
source especially in developing countries is of exorbitant nature .
Fossil fuel is in a state of decreasing availability. This unfavorable
situation when considered with the detrimental effects of fossil fuel
consumption on the environment poses a long overdue problem for
confrontation.Need hitherto has arisen for the discovery and development
of a cheap, alternative and environmental friendly source of energy
such as biomass gasification.
CHAPTER ONE -- [Total Page(s) 2]
Page 2 of 2
-
-
ABSRACT - [ Total Page(s): 1 ]Energy demand in the world today is increasing rapidly and energy generation and resources in the world are incapable of catering for this increase in demand. In third world countries such as Nigeria, energy generation is epileptic; this is evident in the electric power sector of Nigeria. Issues such as Environmental degradation and energy shortages in countries have therefore rekindled interest in alternative and renewable sources of energy. Biomass gasification is one of such sources of energy ... Continue reading---
