With more and more application of biomass in the industry instead of fossil fuel worldwide, we observed that to understand biomass characteristic and manage biomass quality is quite important for all the stakeholders. In recent years China has promulgated more than 10 national standards of biomass fuel testing. Due to the significant characteristics difference between biomass fuels and coal, the standard method of biomass is also different from coal. According to such differences, to deliver a tailor-made instrumental application solution of Gross Calorific Value, Total Sulfur, Moisture, Ash, Volatile matter, Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Ash Fusibility analysis for biomass and alternative fuel RDF/SRF/MSW, CKIC specially launched the Research Project on developing the solution in compliance with ISO, ASTM, CEN and GB standard.
Coal is the plant remains covered in strata, and through complex biological chemistry and physical chemistry, it transformed into organic combustible sedimentary rocks. Biomass fuel is mainly from forestry and agricultural residues and agricultural waste after processing without any chemical and physical changes. Most fuel through grinding into particles make it convenient to transport and combust. Quality parameters of coal and biomass have different characteristics: biomass plant keeps well-developed pores and high moisture content. Its volatile elements, hydrogen content are higher than coal, while calorific value, ash, total sulfur are lower than coal. That is to say, there is obvious difference in combustion characteristics between the biomass and coal.
Based on the experience that specializing in coal quality testing for years, CKIC made a technical feasibility study on 5 series instruments: 5E-C5500 Automatic Calorimeter, 5E-MAG6700 Automatic Proximate Analyzer, 5E-CHN2200 Elemental Analyzer, 5E-IRS II Infrared Sulfur Analyzer and 5E-AF4105 Ash Fusion Determinator according to GB, ISO, ASTM and CEN standard of biomass quality analysis.
Firstly CKIC team collected over 200 biomass samples from China, India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, United Kingdom, and made sample preparation by primary crushing and pulverizing according to the standards, then analyze the samples in CKIC Central Application Laboratory.
Through two-year research by thousands of experiments in accordance with GB, ISO, ASTM and CEN standard, CKIC scientists have explored tailor-made solution by improving the software and hardware design according to the special characteristic and standards of biomass, which has been proved feasible and stable through verification test.
During the research of biomass adaptability of 5E-C5500 Automatic calorimeter, 5E-MAG6700 Automatic Proximate Analyzer, 5E-CHN2200 Elemental Analyzer, 5E-IRS II Infrared Sulfur Analyzer and 5E-AF4105 Ash Fusion Determinator, CKIC team also study the adaptability for other alternative fuels such as RDF/ SRF /MSW, and the results show that it is applicable.
“Better solution leads to better analysis, better analysis leads to better quality”
CKIC will make efforts to deliver more tailor-made applications for various samples such as soil, food, feedstuff, agriculture products, waste water and cosmetics products to service more and more industries.
