Thermochemical Conversion of Sugarcane Bagasse in a Pilot Scale Reactor: An Experimental Study

There is a general consensus about the carbon footprint related on fossil fuels. So, the most prominent strategies to countries that have large biomass production, like sugarcane in Brazil, is to apply thermochemical process to produce bio-based fuels. In this context, pyrolysis and HTL process are more approachable based on recent academic results. This work designed a pilot-scale, continuously operated pyrolysis reactor (12-14 kg/h) and studied optimum conditions to maximize bio-oil yield and minimize pyrogas production. Just setting the air inlet/recycled air streams ratios, three different thermal profiles were achieved, being the ratio 3 the best condition. However, the biofuels HHVs are still far from fossil homologous. After, some future considerations to next steps of the work, about HTL process applicability to same biomass source, were discussed.