Monday 8 September 2014

Procedure for Biomass Pelletization

Biomass pellets are considered as an important type of biomass fuel that is manufactured mainly from agricultural biomass, wood waste, forestry residues, and commercial wastes. These biomass pellets are of great advantage as they are easy to transport and store. In addition, they make best use of wood waste and waste coming from forest and agriculture industry. It also facilitates easy and cost effective handling.

Dense cubic and cylindrical shaped both the pallets have flow ability characteristic as that of cereal grains. This high density of pallets makes them suitable for transporting over long distances. Extremely dense pellets can be created with low moisture content that enhance their capability to be burned with very high combustion efficiency.

Biomass pelletization is the standard way of producing solid and high density pellet from biomass. It is also one of the efficient methods of biomass waste management. To be used in different industries, these pellets are manufactured in several types and supplied as a fuel for electric power plants, homes and other such applications. That is why pellet making equipments are available in variety of sizes and scales.

Selection of small or bug pellet making equipments also depends upon the scale of industry. In general, pellets are of cylindrical shape and are about 6-25 mm in diameter and 3-50 mm in length. Production of pellets consists of a series of steps including collection of raw material (wood shaving, saw dust, agricultural residue, and wood wastes) and its pre-treatment, pelletization, and post treatment. The first step is the preparation of feedstock includes choosing a feedstock suitable for this process, its filtration, storage, and protection.

Filtration is done to remove impurities like metal and stone. Main attention is paid on the storage of this feedstock so to prevent it from the impurities. For this, a blending process is used. If the moisture content in biomass exceeds 50-60% then the equipment named rotary drum dryer is used. In addition, flash dryers, superheated steam dryers, belt dryers, and spouted bed dryers can also be used.

Drying increases the efficiency of biomass and makes it smokeless at the time of combustion. The process of drying takes around 70% of the total energy used in the entire process of pelletization which is used for converting waste into fuel sources. But, the feedstock should never be over dried, as low content of moisture helps in effective binding of biomass.

Before feeding biomass to the pellet mills, it should be reduce to particle size of 3mm as wrong size can affect the quality of pellets and causes high consumption of energy. In the next step of pelletization biomass is compressed against heated metal plate using a roller. This metal plate is commonly known as die and consists of holes of fixed diameter through which biomass is passed under pressure.

Due to rise in pressure, frictional force increases and leads to high temperature which causes lignin & resins present in the biomass to soften to act as a binding agent between the biomass fibers. In this way biomass particles fuse to form pellets.

Jay Khodiyar Machine Tools is manufacturing biofuel machine and briquetting machinery for biomass waste management. These machines help to convert waste into fuel so to protect the environment.

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