Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Energy Conversion and Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman

Air gasication of empty fruit bunch for hydrogen-rich gas production in a

uidized-bed reactor
M.A.A. Mohammed, A. Salmiaton , W.A.K.G. Wan Azlina, M.S. Mohammad Amran, A. Fakhrul-Razi
Department of Chemical & Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 9 November 2009
Received in revised form 23 August 2010
Accepted 4 October 2010
Available online 30 October 2010
Keywords:
Biomass
Empty fruit bunch
Gasication
Hydrogen
Yield
Energy source

a b s t r a c t
A study on gasication of empty fruit bunch (EFB), a waste of the palm oil industry, was investigated. The
composition and particle size distribution of feedstock were determined and the thermal degradation
behaviour was analysed by a thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Then uidized bed bench scale gasication unit was used to investigate the effect of the operating parameters on EFB air gasication namely
reactor temperature in the range of 7001000 C, feedstock particle size in the range of 0.31.0 mm
and equivalence ratio (ER) in the range of 0.150.35. The main gas species generated, as identied by
a gas chromatography (GC), were H2, CO, CO2 and CH4. With temperature increasing from 700 C to
1000 C, the total gas yield was enhanced greatly and reached the maximum value (92 wt.%, on the
raw biomass sample basis) at 1000 C with big portions of H2 (38.02 vol.%) and CO (36.36 vol.%). Feedstock particle size showed an inuence on the upgrading of H2, CO and CH4 yields. The feedstock particle
size of 0.30.5 mm, was found to obtain a higher H2 yield (33.93 vol.%), and higher LHV of gas product
(15.26 MJ/m3). Equivalence ratio (ER) showed a signicant inuence on the upgrading of hydrogen production and product distribution. The optimum ER (0.25) was found to attain a higher H2 yield
(27.31 vol.%) at 850 C. Due to the low efciency of bench scale gasication unit the system needs to
be scaling-up. The cost analysis for scale-up EFB gasication unit showed that the hydrogen supply cost
is RM 6.70/kg EFB ($2.11/kg = $0.18/Nm3).
2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Dependence on fossil fuels as the main energy sources has led
to serious energy crisis and environmental problems. Therefore,
due to the environmental considerations as well as the increasing
demand for energy in the world, more attention has been paid to
develop new energy sources [1]. Owing to that, there has been
interest in the utilization of biomass for production of environmental friendly biofuels. As known, biomass is a CO2 neutral resource in
the life cycle, while CO2 is a primary contributor to the global
greenhouse effect. Hence, increasing attention is being paid to biomass as a substitute for fossil fuel to reduce the global greenhouse
effect, particularly under the commitment of the Kyoto Protocol.
Biomass used as an energy resource can be efciently achieved
by thermo-chemical conversion technology: pyrolysis, gasication
or combustion. Gasication process is one of the most promising
thermo-chemical conversion routes to recover energy from biomass. During gasication process, biomass is thermal decomposed
to small quantities of char and ash, liquid oil and high production
of gaseous products under limited presence of oxygen following

Corresponding author. Tel.: +60 3 89466297; fax: +60 3 86567120.

E-mail address: mie@eng.upm.edu.my (A. Salmiaton).
0196-8904/$ - see front matter 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.enconman.2010.10.023

Eq. (1). The yields of end products of gasication and the composition of gases are dependent on several parameters including temperature, biomass species, particle size, heating rate, operating
pressure and reactor conguration [2].

Biomass heat ! H2 CO CO2 CH4 Hydrocarbon

Char

The concern of using biomass in gasication to produce a

hydrogen rich product has been getting particular attention in recent years. The reasons may be attributed to: (1) hydrogen is a
clean and efcient energy source and is expected to take an important role in a future energy demand; (2) hydrogen is a safe source
and can be easily stored as a gas or a liquid; (3) hydrogen has good
properties in fuelling engines in automobiles; and (4) most important, current and future energy technologies are extensively
increasing the possibility of utilizing hydrogen with economic
acceptance. Apparently, how to force the biomass gasication process into shift towards the maximum hydrogen rich end product is
becoming a priority topic [3].
Various types of biofuels can be produced from gasication process after catalytically upgrading the syngas by using Fischer
Tropsch (FTS) synthesis and Higher Alcohol synthesis (HAS)
technologies [4]. Through the FTS reaction, syngas can be

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M.A.A. Mohammed et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

converted to a wide range of long chain hydrocarbon products, like

gasoline, naphtha, diesel and wax. The long chain hydrocarbons
produced from the FTS reaction are distilled and hydro-cracked before being used as a liquid transportation fuel [5]. There are also
many types of alcohols such as methanol and ethanol that can be
produced using HAS technology. The syngas produced from gasication process will be catalytically converted to alcohols under this
technology. Ethanol is an important renewable liquid fuel for motor vehicles. The production of ethanol from biomass can signicantly reduce both the dependency on fossil fuel sources and
environmental pollution [6].
Oil palm (Elaeis guianensis) originally originates from West
Africa. It grows well in wet and humid places like Malaysia. In
the present time Malaysia is the worlds largest producer and exporter of palm oil. Its currently accounts for 51% of the world palm
oil production and 62% of the world exports. Palm oil production in
Malaysia has increased from 2.57 million metric tons in 1980 to
17.8 million metric tons in 2009 [7]. Beside palm oil availability,
Malaysian palm oil also generates huge quantity of oil palm biomass including oil palm trunks, oil palm fronds, empty fruit
bunches (EFB), shells and bers in the production of palm oil. There
was annual generation of 9.66, 5.20 and 17.08 million tons for ber, shell and empty fruit bunches respectively [8]. Oil palm is a
multipurpose plantation and also a prolic producer of biomass
as raw materials for value-added industries [9]. For example, fresh
fruit bunch contains only 21% palm oil, while the rest 67% palm
kernel, 1415% ber, 67% shell and 23% empty fruit bunch (EFB)
are left as biomass [10].
In Malaysia, there has been a strong interest in the utilization of
oil palm biomass for the production of environmental friendly biofuels. The implementation of biofuels program in Malaysia is in
line with the government policy in ensuring a sustainable development of the energy sector as well as promoting a clean environment. For examples, the government has embarked on the
growth of renewable energy as the fth fuel after oil, gas, hydro,
and coal, initiated earlier under the Third Outline Perspective Plan
(OPP3), 20002010 [11], and the ninth Malaysian plan (9MP),
20062010 [12].
Till now, a lot of work has been done and many processes are
being investigated on hydrogen-rich gas production from biomasses [1318]. Among them, thermo-chemical processes (gasication and pyrolysis) are the most promising and applied
solutions for second generation fuels.
Presently, many research works related to the gasication of
biomass using different operating processes such as types of gasiers (xed bed, moving bed and uidized bed), gasication agents
(air, oxygen, steam or their mixtures) and operating conditions
(temperature, pressure, equivalent ratio (ER)) have been presented
and extensive researches have been conducted on small and
medium size air gasiers to produce low BTU fuel gas and power
[1926].
Gasifying agent is one of the most important parameters in the
gasication process. It plays an important role during the gasication reactions. The agent can be air, pure oxygen, steam or their
mixtures. Air is cheap and widely used in the gasication process,
however, it contains large amount of nitrogen, which reduces the
heating value of the syngas produced. On the other hand, if pure
oxygen is used, the heating value of syngas will increase but at
the same time, the operating costs will also increase due to the
oxygen production [27], and the same can be said for using steam
as gasifying agent. The low caloric value syngas produced from air
gasication can be directly utilized as fuel for gas turbines and gas
engines [28] or can used as an industrial feedstock for heat and
power generation. Yet, the condensable organic compounds (tar)
need to be removed using hot gas cleaning method or catalytic
reforming of tar.

Currently, oil palm biomass (shell, ber and EFB) can be converted to the high-value products via thermo-chemical conversion processes. Yang et al. [21] have investigated the use of the
palm oil wastes as a feedstock to produce hydrogen-rich gas via
pyrolysis process in xed bed reactor. The authors reported that
the palm oil wastes could be ideal biomass sources for biofuels
production The total gas yield was enhanced by increasing reactor
temperature with the maximum 70 wt.% of gas yield achieved
per raw biomass sample with good portions of H2 (33.49 vol.%).
Kelly-Yong et al. [29] have studied the thermodynamic analysis
of hydrogen production from oil palm biomass in gasication
reaction using supercritical water (SCW) technology. The authors
reported that the utilization of SCW medium in biomass gasication can directly deal with high moisture content of biomass
(>50%). Therefore, preliminary treatment such as biomass drying
could be avoided which will automatically reduce the operating
cost of the process. In addition, the feasibility study of obtaining
hydrogen from palm oil biomass (0.117 kg H2 kg1 biomass) was
obtained. Abdullah et al. [30] investigated the fast pyrolysis of
EFB using 150 g/h uidized-bed reactor to produce bio-oil. The results showed that the maximum bio-oil production was 55.1 wt.%
at 450 C at only 1.03 s vapor residence time.
This study focuses on using EFB, a waste from the palm oil
industry as a feedstock material using air gasication process in
bench scale uidized bed gasier. Different operation conditions
namely reactor temperature, feedstock particle size and equivalence ratio will be investigated to achieve an improved performance of EFB conversion to energy with a high yield of
hydrogen-rich gas.

2. Materials and methods

2.1. Feedstock preparation and properties
The EFB sample investigated in this study was collected from
Seri Ulu Langat palm oil mill, Dengkil, Selangor. EFB used in this
work is the biomass remaining as a by-product of industrial process after removal of the nuts. Samples received were relatively
dry having less than 10 wt.% moisture, and were in the form of
whole bunches. Particle size reduction was required to allow gasication of the EFB on the available 600 g/h reactor. The bunches
were rst manually chopped into small pieces that could be fed
in a shredder. After that, a Fritsch grinder with a screen size of
1.0 mm was used to obtain the feedstock size of less than
1.0 mm. The distribution of feed particle size after grinding is given
in Table 1. After extensive feeding trials, it is found that only particles between 0.3 and 1.0 mm were easily fed. Both the size fraction below and above this range frequently led to blockage of the
available feeder.
The proximate and elemental analyses were carried out in a
TGA (Mettler-Toledo TGA/SDTA 851) and CHNS/O analyzer (LECO
CHNS932), respectively. The results are listed in Table 2. EFB had
a very high volatile content (>80 wt.%) and low amounts of xed
carbon (<10 wt.%). The caloric value of EFB (17 MJ/kg) was measured in a bomb calorimeter (Parr 1341); this is lower than that of
coal, possibly due to the low xed carbon and high oxygen contents in the EFB [31]. The ultimate analysis indicates that EFB is

Table 1
Particle size distribution of EFB.
Feed particle size (mm)

Mass fraction

Less than 0.3

0.30.5
0.51.0

22
50
28

M.A.A. Mohammed et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

Table 2
Properties of EFB.
Component

Measured (wt.%)

Cellulose
Hemicellulose
Lignin
Asha
Extractivesa

22.24
20.58
30.45
8.28
18.45

Elemental analysis
C
H
N
S
Ob

46.62
6.45
1.21
0.035
45.66

Proximate analysis
Mad
Vad
Ad
FCad
Caloric value (MJ/kg)

5.18
82.58
3.45
8.79
17.02

M: moisture; V: volatile matters; A: ash; FC: xed carbon; ad:

on air dried basis; d: on dry basis.
a
Remaining value obtained from Acid Detergent Fiber
(ADF), Neutral Detergent Fiber (NDF) and Acid Detergent
Lignin (ADL) analysis method.
b
The oxygen content was determined by difference.

environmental friendly, with trace amounts of nitrogen, sulfur and

mineral matter.

3. Experimental procedure
A uidized bed bench scale gasication unit operating at atmospheric pressure was employed for all runs. Fig. 1 shows a schematic diagram of this unit, which consists of three main systems:
reactor (gasication reactor and heating furnace), condenser and
purication (condenser, glass wool lter and dryer) and gas storage
(gasbags). The reactor is a cylindrical conguration made of stainless steel with a length of 600 mm and a diameter of 40 mm. Three
thermocouples were inserted in the middle of the heating furnace,
middle of the reactor tube and bottom of the reactor tube, respectively. Biomass was fed into the reactor by a feeder on the top of
the reactor, which were continuously carried out at a constant ow

1557

rate. The feeding capacity of biomass was 10 g/min. The heating

medium in the reactor was inert sand of size between 0.3 and
0.5 mm. The uidizing gas was air, entering from the base of the
reactor.
The condensable part of the product gas was collected from the
ice water condenser, whereas the incondensable gases leaved the
system through glass wool/silica gel lter and then were collected
by gasbags for gas chromatography (GC) analysis. The tar product
was trapped in the water cooler, ice condenser walls and glass
wool/silica gel lter. Dichloromethane (DCM) was used to remove
the tar from condenser walls and lter. The dissolved product was
then ltered using lter paper and the ltrate was heated in an
oven at 70 C for about 2 h to evaporate any rising solution. The
heated ltrate was then weighed to get the weight of tar.
The yield of the products was quantied as mass basis. The solid
product called charcoal was removed from the reactor and separated from the sand bed then weighed to get the solid mass. The
yield of the total product gas was then calculated by difference.
3.1. Product gas analysis
0.5 mL of the product gas was analyzed in gas chromatography
(GC) Agilent Technologies model HP6890 N with TCD and FID
detectors. A 30 m HP-Molesieve capillary column was used to separate the permanent gases. The internal diameter and lm thickness of the column were 0.53 mm and 0.5 lm, respectively. The
oven temperature was set at 70 C and carrier gas ow rate (Argon)
was 6 mL/min. The splitless inlet and TCD detector temperature
were 60 and 200 C, respectively. The TCD was calibrated with
standard gas (Air Product, Malaysia) mixture containing CO, CO2,
H2 and CH4 in nitrogen at periodic intervals.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Thermogravimetric analysis of EFB
The thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) was performed under
10 mL/min air with a heating rate of 10 C/min. The thermal degradation characteristics of different particle size dried feedstock are
displayed in Fig. 2 by thermogravimetry (TG) and differential thermogravimetry curves (DTG), respectively. The EFB samples showed
a small DTG peaks around 100 C, which are indicative to the mois-

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of biomass air gasication in a uidized bed: (1) lab-scale gratier, (2) electric furnace, (3) air pump, (4) biomass feeder, (5) ange, (6)
thermocouples, (7) air distributor, (8) temperature recorder, (9) gas discharge, (10) water cooler, (11) ice trap, (12) cooling water supply, (13) glass wool lter, (14) fuel gas
sampling point, and (15) gas ow meter.

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M.A.A. Mohammed et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

ture content, followed by big peaks around 300 C, which are indicative to the decomposition of cellulose and hemicellulose, while
the humps apparent around 450 C are indicative to the decomposition of lignin. Similar weight loss rate was observed in other researches [32,33]. The distinction between hemicellulose and
cellulose breakdowns was not fully understood but it had been
established that hemicellulose broke down at lower temperature
compared to cellulose [34].

4.2. Effect of reactor bed temperature on product yields

The yields of nal products from EFB gasication under different temperatures are shown in Fig. 3. As shown in Fig. 3a with temperature increasing from 700 to 1000 C, the total gas yields
increased sharply from 62.68 to 91.7 wt.%, while liquid, char and
tar yields reduced gradually. Meanwhile, varying temperature
showed a great inuence on gas product components. The main
gas products are H2, CO, CO2, CH4 and some C2 hydrocarbons traces
(C2H4 and C2H6).
As shown in Fig. 3b, H2 content increased progressively from
10.27 to 38.02 vol.% as temperature increased from 700 to
1000 C. CH4 yield also increased from 5.84 to 14.72 vol.%., whilst
CO2 content decreased in general with temperature increasing,
particularly at 1000 C. The CO yield was initially increased from
21.87 to 33.35 vol.% as temperature increased to 800 C, then de-

Fig. 3. Effect of temperature on EFB gasication yield: (a) effect of temperature on

product yield, (b) effect of temperature on product gas composition.

Fig. 2. Thermal degradation characteristics of EFB: (a) thermogravimetric analysis

of EFB, (b) differential thermogravimetric analysis of EFB.

creased to 33.08 vol.% at temperature 900 C, before it increased

again to 36.36 vol.% as temperature continuously increased to
1000 C. The C2H4 and C2H6 yields were relatively small and the
inuence of temperature was insignicant. The thermal cracking
of gas-phase hydrocarbons at high temperature might explain
the variation of gas product distribution observed [35]. At high
furnace temperature, the gas species generated from biomass at
pyrolysis zone could undergo further reactions (secondary reactions) such as tar cracking and shifting reaction, leading to much
more incondensable gases (including H2) generated. Therefore,
the total yield of gases products increased signicantly as temperature increased from 700 to 1000 C. The main reactions involved could be expressed using the following Eqs. (2)(10)
[35,36]. Among them, Eqs. (2)(6) are principle or heterogenous
gasication reactions whilst Eqs. (7)(11) are homogenous and
secondary reactions. In terms of increasing H2 production, Eqs.
(5), (7)(10) are the main reactions of interest for EFB gasication
at atmospheric pressure and temperature between 700 and
1000 C. The other gases component might increase or decrease
with the occurring of secondary reactions. As a result, more H2
can be obtained when secondary reactions occur signicantly.
From the above analysis, it can be concluded that higher temperature (1000 C) is favorable for thermal cracking of tar and shift
reaction.

M.A.A. Mohammed et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

C O2 ! CO2

C 1=2O2 ! CO

C CO2 ! 2CO

C H2 Og ! CO H2

C 2H2 ! CH4

CO H2 O ! CO2 H2

CH4 H2 Og ! CO 3H2

CH4 CO2 ! 2CO 2H2

Tar H2 Og ! CO H2 O CH4 H2 Cm Hn

10

Cm Hn nH2 O ! nCO n m=2H2 

11

1559

The lower heating value (LHV, MJ/m ) of the gas products can be
calculated using the following equation [21,35].

LHV 30:0xCO 25:7xH2 85:4xCH4 151:3xCn Hm x4:2

12

CO, H2, CH4 and CnHm in the above equation are the molar ratio
of the CO, H2, CH4 and other hydrocarbon (C2H2 and C2H6) in the
gas product. As shown in Fig. 3a, the heating value of total gas
products increase steadily as the temperature increases. At
1000 C, LHV of gas products reached 15.55 MJ/m3, which belongs
to be medium level of heat values for gas fuels that can be directly
used for gas engine, gas turbine or boiler for power generation.
Also it can be used for the chemical formation of methanol and
methane [31].
4.3. Effect of feedstock particle size on product yields
The second series of experiment was performed to establish the
effect of feedstock particle size on the EFB gasication product
yields. In this study, the experiments were conducted by using
three different feedstock particle size ranges, namely <0.3 mm,
0.30.5 mm and 0.51.0 mm with constant reactor temperature
of 850 C. As shown in Fig. 4a, the smallest particle size of
<0.3 mm produced a gas yield of 74.79 wt.%, about 2% higher than
larger particle size of 0.51.0 mm, which produced a gas yield of
72.74 wt.%, while particles size of 0.30.5 produced a gas yield
73.33 wt.%. The total gas yield decreased with feedstock particle
size increased, while char and tar yields increased with increasing
of feedstock particle size. An increase in feedstock particle size
causes greater temperature gradient inside the particle so that at
a given time the core temperature is lower than of the surface,
which possibly gives rise to an increase in the char and liquids
yields and decrease in gases [37].
Fig. 4b showed that the smaller EFB particles produced more
CO, CH4 and less CO2 than the larger ones, while hydrogen yields
was almost the same (32.99 and 33.93 vol.%) for particles size of
<0.3 mm and 0.30.5 mm, respectively, then decreased to
21.57 vol.%. for particle size of 0.51.0 mm. However, in this study
it was observed that the smallest feedstock particle size of
<0.3 mm obtained maximum yield of gas product, while the feedstock particle size in range of 0.30.5 mm obtained the optimum
gas composition and highest LHV of gas product.
4.4. Effect of equivalence ratio (ER) on product yields
The equivalence ratio (ER) is dened as the ratio of oxygen (air)
required for gasication to oxygen (air) required for stoichiometric
combustion of a given amount of biomass [38]. In this work, ER

Fig. 4. Effect of feedstock particle size on EFB gasication yield at temperature of

850 C: (a) effect of feedstock particle size on product yield, (b) effect of feedstock
particle size on product gas composition.

was varied from 0.15 to 0.35 in increments of 0.05, keeping nal

temperature of the reactor at 850 C and feedstock particle size
at range of 0.30.5 mm. The air ow rate entering the reactor
was varied to investigate the effect of ER. As shown in Fig. 5a, with
increased in ER, char and tar yield decreased from 13.65 to
2.12 wt.% and 9.83 to 2.82 wt.% respectively, while gas yield increased from 70.75 to 86.46 wt.%. The lower heating value (LHV)
of the gases decreased slightly from 15.38 to 12.35 MJ/m3. Increase
in ER increases oxidation reaction and decrease the product gas
quality. However, too high ER cause low concentrations of H2
and CO with high CO2 content in the product gas. As shown in
Fig. 5b, with ER varied from 0.15 to 0.35, the H2 content increased
and reached to maximum value of 27.42 vol.% at ER of 0.25 and
then dropped to 18.37 vol.% with further increase in ER, while
the CO2 content increased steadily, from 16.66 vol.% to
36.05 vol.%; CH4 and other hydrocarbons traces content were on
the contrary. It can be explained that in the gasication process,
oxidization reactions are always strong, and oxidization reactions
of combustible product gases strengthen with ER, which results
in more CO2. Several groups [3941] investigated the effect of ER
in air gasication of biomass in a uidized bed gasier. They found
that with increase in ER, H2, CO increased initially and then decreased, while CO2, CH4 and other hydrocarbons content were progressively decreased, which are similar with our ndings. Through

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M.A.A. Mohammed et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

(a)

Table 4
Basis of cost analysis.
Items

Data

Capacity

EFB: 144 kg/d

(51.84 t/y)
H2: 7.488 kg/d
(2.69 t/y)
Gasier
Furnace
Construction
expenditure
Total
Feed

Capital

Operation

Electricity

(b)

H2

CO

CH4

10% of capital cost

Maintenance

5% of capital cost

Other

1% of capital cost

H2 product
cost

RM 6.7/kg = $2.11/
kg: $0.18/Nm3

RM 3119
RM5865
RM1746
RM10730
RM2592

RM3000/
y
RM1073/
y
RM536.5/
y
RM107.3/
y

RM50/t, including
collection and
transportation
RM0.28/kWh

CO2

50
Table 5
Hydrogen cost through different process.

40

Yield, Vol. %

Interest

Note

30

20

10

0
0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.35

0.4

ER
Fig. 5. Effect of equivalence ratio (ER) on EFB gasication yield at temperature of
850 C and feedstock particle size of 0.30.5 mm: (a) effect of equivalence ratio (ER)
on product yield, (b) effect of equivalence ratio (ER) on product gas composition.

the analysis on the experimental results of varying ER, it can be

understood that the optimum value for ER is 0.25, which maximum hydrogen content can be obtained.

5. Cost analysis
Performance data of uidized bed biomass gasier system used
in this study is given in Table 3. Due to the low efciency of bench
scale gasication unit, the system needs to be scaling-up. The principal costs of H2 production from EFB biomass using uidized bed
gasier are estimated as follows: It is assumed that 6 kg/h (144 kg/

Table 3
Performance data on uidized bed EFB gasier.
Feed rate of EFB (kg/h)
Feed rate of air (Nm3/h)
Gasier temperature (C)
Gas composition (vol.%)
H2
CO
CH4
CO2
LHV of gas (MJ/m3)

6.0
7.2
850
26.70
33.36
16.04
26.11
12.84

H2 cost

Process

Reference

$10/kg
$4.28/kg
$1.69/kg
$2.11/kg

Electrolyzed hydrogen
Biomass pyrolysis with high-pressure
Biomass gasication with CO-shift
EFB air gasication

[42]
[43]
[44]
This study

d) of EFB would be the raw material for gasication process to produce 0.052 kg H2/kg EFB (7.48 kg H2/d = 84.13 Nm3/d). The capital
cost of this system covers uidized bed gasier, furnace and construction expenditure. Costs of operation, interest, maintenance
and other expenses are assumed as shown in Table 4.
Based on the operating parameters and data of capital cost, the
calculation result of H2 product cost from this system is RM 6.7 for
every kilograms of EFB which is equal to $2.11/kg EFB ($0.18/Nm3).
For comparison, Table 5 presents other researchers cost analysis on H2 through different processes.

6. Conclusions
In this study, air gasication of EFB, one of the most abundant
biomass found in Malaysia, was carried out in bench scale uidized
bed gasier. The operating parameters namely reactor temperature, biomass particle size and equivalence ratio were tested to
determine their effects on total products yields, product gas composition and LHV gas. The main products of EFB air gasication
were solid charcoal, liquid oil, tar and hydrogen-rich gas product.
Temperature was an important factor in this process. As the temperature increased from 700 to 1000 C the gas yield increased signicantly whilst solid, liquid and tar yields progressively
decreased. The gas products mainly consisted of H2, CO, CO2 and
CH4. High temperature is favorable for the increasing gas products
including H2, CO, CH4. The LHV gas increased with temperature and
reached to 15.55 MJ/m3 at 1000 C. The EFB particle size had an
inuence on the total gas yield and gas composition; smaller EFB
particle size produced more CH4, CO and less CO2. On top of that,
LHV gas increased with smaller EFB particle size. ER had complex
effect on the gasication products. The ER of 0.25 was found to
be optimum to yield a maximum H2 production of 27.31 vol.% at

M.A.A. Mohammed et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 52 (2011) 15551561

850 C in this work. Based on the operating parameters and data of

capital cost, the estimation cost of H2 from this system is RM 6.7/kg
EFB ($2.11/kg EFB = $0.18/Nm3).
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Department of Chemical &
Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia for nancial support on this project.
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