Synergistic effect, kinetic and thermodynamics parameters analyses of co-gasification of municipal solid waste and bituminous coal with CO2.

Co-gasification of municipal solid waste (MSW) with bituminous coal (BC) is an attractive alternative to realize the harmless disposal and energy harvesting of MSW. In this work, co-gasification characteristics and synergistic interaction of MSW and BC with CO2 atmosphere are studied by thermogravimetric method, including analyses of thermodynamics, kinetic parameters and reaction mechanism function. Results indicate that MSW gasification process can be divided into four main stages, and that of BC has only three main stages. Gasification temperature of coal char is much higher than that of MSW char, and addition of MSW can significantly improve the gasification reactivity of BC. Besides, a significant synergistic effect is observed for all the blends in char gasification stage. Based on three kinetic methods of Flynn-Wall-Ozawa (Xie et al., 2018), Starink (Zhang et al., 2019a) and Friedman, the minimum average activation energy Ea (184.13 kJ/mol) is obtained when the blend ratio of BC is 40% which might be an optimal option for co-gasification of the blends. The average values of the enthalpy, the Gibbs function and the entropy changes for sample 60MSW40BC are 176.82 kJ/mol, 257.89 kJ/mol and -89.16 J/mol·K, respectively. According to the Malek method, F6, A1 and D7 models are probably more suitable to describe three main stages of sample 60MSW40BC CO2 co-gasification.

Thermally Developing Flow and Heat Transfer in Elliptical Minichannels with Constant Wall Temperature.

Laminar convective heat transfer of elliptical minichannels is investigated for hydrodynamically fully developed but thermal developing flow with no-slip condition. A three-dimensional numerical model is developed in different elliptical geometries with the aspect ratio varying from 0.2 to 1. The effect of Reynolds number (25 ≤ Re ≤ 2000) on the local Nusselt number is examined in detail. The results indicate that the local Nusselt number is a decreasing function of Reynolds number and it is sensitive to Reynolds number especially for Re less than 250. The effect of aspect ratio on local Nusselt number is small when compared with the effect of Reynolds number on local Nusselt number. The local Nusselt number is independent of cross-section geometry at the inlet. The maximum effect of aspect ratio on local Nusselt number arises at the transition section rather than the fully developed region. However, the non-dimensional thermal entrance length is a monotonic decreasing concave function of aspect ratio but a weak function of Reynolds number. Correlations for the local Nusselt number and the thermal developing length for elliptical channels are developed with good accuracy, which may provide guidance for design and optimization of elliptical minichannel heat sinks.

Energy, exergy and economic analyses of a novel biomass fueled power plant with carbon capture and sequestration.

The biomass based power plants, especially those with the carbon capture unit, usually suffer the issue of low electric efficiency, which is adverse to their commercial application. As one approach to solving this issue, a novel biomass fueled power plant with carbon capture and sequestration (BFP-CCS) is proposed in this work. The BFP-CCS subunit models are first validated before the integrated model of BFP-CCS is built. Then, the BFP-CCS characteristics are analyzed in terms of energy, exergy and economics, and the optimum operation condition of BFP-CCS is determined. Based on this research, it is found that BFP-CCS performs best at the H2O/Mn2O3 mass ratio of 1.6, the H2O/O2 molar ratio of 2.8, the O2/biomass mass ratio of 0.22 and the fuel utilization factor of 0.65. The corresponding net efficiency, the life cycle CO2 emission and the levelized cost of electricity of BFP-CCS are 51.7%, $0.0501 /kWh and -0.591 kg/kWh, respectively. The biggest contributors of the energy and exergy losses are the steam turbine and the solid oxide fuel cell in BFP-CCS, respectively. The major implication of this study is that an efficient and economical BFP-CCS system is put forward, which is promising for CO2 removal during power generation.

Pressure Drop of Microchannel Plate Fin Heat Sinks.

The entrance region constitutes a considerable fraction of the channel length in miniaturized devices. Laminar slip flow in microchannel plate fin heat sinks under hydrodynamically developing conditions is investigated semi-analytically and numerically in this paper. The semi-analytical model for the pressure drop of microchannel plate fin heat sinks is obtained by solving the momentum equation with the first-order velocity slip boundary conditions at the channel walls. The simple pressure drop model utilizes fundamental solutions from fluid dynamics to predict its constitutive components. The accuracy of the model is examined using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations and the experimental and numerical data available in the literature. The model can be applied to either apparent liquid slip over hydrophobic and superhydrophobic surfaces or gas slip flow in microchannel heat sinks. The developed model has an accuracy of 92 percent for slip flow in microchannel plate fin heat sinks. The developed model may be used to predict the pressure drop of slip flow in microchannel plate fin heat sinks for minimizing the effort and expense of experiments, especially in the design and optimization of microchannel plate fin heat sinks.

Lattice Boltzmann Simulation of the Hydrodynamic Entrance Region of Rectangular Microchannels in the Slip Regime.

Developing a three-dimensional laminar flow in the entrance region of rectangular microchannels has been investigated in this paper. When the hydrodynamic development length is the same magnitude as the microchannel length, entrance effects have to be taken into account, especially in relatively short ducts. Simultaneously, there are a variety of non-continuum or rarefaction effects, such as velocity slip and temperature jump. The available data in the literature appearing on this issue is quite limited, the available study is the semi-theoretical approximate model to predict pressure drop of developing slip flow in rectangular microchannels with different aspect ratios. In this paper, we apply the lattice Boltzmann equation method (LBE) to investigate the developing slip flow through a rectangular microchannel. The effects of the Reynolds number (1 < Re < 1000), channel aspect ratio (0 < ε < 1), and Knudsen number (0.001 < Kn < 0.1) on the dimensionless hydrodynamic entrance length, and the apparent friction factor, and Reynolds number product, are examined in detail. The numerical solution of LBM can recover excellent agreement with the available data in the literature, which proves its accuracy in capturing fundamental fluid characteristics in the slip-flow regime.

Investigation on biomass steam gasification in a dual fluidized bed reactor with the granular kinetic theory.

The dual fluidized bed (DFB) reactor is promising to convert biomass into high-quality syngas efficiently. In this work, a three-dimensional model is built based on the granular kinetic theory to predict the biomass steam gasification in dual fluidized bed reactors. The model is firstly validated against a series of experimental results. Then, the effects of some essential operation parameters including the biomass flow rate (Fb), the steam to fuel ratio (Rsf) and the gasification temperature (Tg) on the biomass steam gasification properties in a DFB reactor are comprehensively analyzed with the orthogonal method. In the concerned ranges of the operation parameters, the cold gas efficiency is found to be the most sensitive to Fb and least sensitive to Tg. The optimal cold gas efficiency of the DFB gasifier is 82.9% when Fb, Rsf and Tg are 15 kg/h, 1.5 and 900 °C, respectively, and the H2 mole fraction is 46.62%.

Characterization of a dual fluidized bed gasifier with blended biomass/coal as feedstock.

A one-dimensional model is built based on the commercial Aspen Plus software to kinetically simulate the biomass/coal co-gasification process in a dual fluidized bed gasifier. The synergistic effect on the co-gasification kinetics is allowed for, and is coupled with the gas-solid flow hydrodynamics. With the developed model, the effects of different key operating parameters including the biomass blending ratio (Rb), the initial bed temperature (Tg), the feedstock mass flow rate (Ffs), the bed material flux (Fbm) and the steam to carbon ratio (Rsc) on the resultant syngas composition and the supplemental fuel mass flow rate (Fsf) are investigated, and the operation parameters are optimized. It is found that increasing Rb and Tg can enhance the gasification, while increasing Ffs and Rsc restricts the gasification. Increasing Fbm has slight effect on the gasification results but can reduce Fsf. The cold gas efficiency is up to 78.9% under the proposed optimum condition.

On a clean power generation system with the co-gasification of biomass and coal in a quadruple fluidized bed gasifier.

A clean power generation system was built based on the steam co-gasification of biomass and coal in a quadruple fluidized bed gasifier. The chemical looping with oxygen uncoupling technology was used to supply oxygen for the calciner. The solid oxide fuel cell and the steam turbine were combined to generate power. The calcium looping and mineral carbonation were used for CO2 capture and sequestration. The aim of this work was to study the characteristics of this system. The effects of key operation parameters on the system total energy efficiency (ŋten), total exergy efficiency (ŋtex) and carbon sequestration rate (Rcs) were detected. The energy and exergy balance calculations were implemented and the corresponding Sankey and Grassmann diagrams were drawn. It was found that the maximum energy and exergy losses occurred in the steam turbine. The system ŋten and ŋtex could be ∼50% and ∼47%, and Rcs could be over unit.

Simulation of biomass-steam gasification in fluidized bed reactors: Model setup, comparisons and preliminary predictions.

A user-defined solver integrating the solid-gas surface reactions and the multi-phase particle-in-cell (MP-PIC) approach is built based on the OpenFOAM software. The solver is tested against experiments. Then, biomass-steam gasification in a dual fluidized bed (DFB) gasifier is preliminarily predicted. It is found that the predictions agree well with the experimental results. The bed material circulation loop in the DFB can form automatically and the bed height is about 1m. The voidage gradually increases along the height of the bed zone in the bubbling fluidized bed (BFB) of the DFB. The U-bend and cyclone can separate the syngas in the BFB and the flue gas in the circulating fluidized bed. The concentration of the gasification products is relatively higher in the conical transition section, and the dry and nitrogen-free syngas at the BFB outlet is predicted to be composed of 55% H2, 20% CO, 20% CO2 and 5% CH4.

Thermodynamic analyses of a biomass-coal co-gasification power generation system.

A novel chemical looping power generation system is presented based on the biomass-coal co-gasification with steam. The effects of different key operation parameters including biomass mass fraction (Rb), steam to carbon mole ratio (Rsc), gasification temperature (Tg) and iron to fuel mole ratio (Rif) on the system performances like energy efficiency (ηe), total energy efficiency (ηte), exergy efficiency (ηex), total exergy efficiency (ηtex) and carbon capture rate (ηcc) are analyzed. A benchmark condition is set, under which ηte, ηtex and ηcc are found to be 39.9%, 37.6% and 96.0%, respectively. Furthermore, detailed energy Sankey diagram and exergy Grassmann diagram are drawn for the entire system operating under the benchmark condition. The energy and exergy efficiencies of the units composing the system are also predicted.

Sphere Drag and Heat Transfer.

Modelling fluid flows past a body is a general problem in science and engineering. Historical sphere drag and heat transfer data are critically examined. The appropriate drag coefficient is proposed to replace the inertia type definition proposed by Newton. It is found that the appropriate drag coefficient is a desirable dimensionless parameter to describe fluid flow physical behavior so that fluid flow problems can be solved in the simple and intuitive manner. The appropriate drag coefficient is presented graphically, and appears more general and reasonable to reflect the fluid flow physical behavior than the traditional century old drag coefficient diagram. Here we present drag and heat transfer experimental results which indicate that there exists a relationship in nature between the sphere drag and heat transfer. The role played by the heat flux has similar nature as the drag. The appropriate drag coefficient can be related to the Nusselt number. This finding opens new possibilities in predicting heat transfer characteristics by drag data. As heat transfer for flow over a body is inherently complex, the proposed simple means may provide an insight into the mechanism of heat transfer for flow past a body.