Characterization of Canadian biomass for alternative renewable biofuel

Biomass represents the renewable energy source and their use reduces the consumption of fossil fuels and limits the emission of CO2, SON, NO,, and heavy metals. They are used in pyrolysis, gasification, combustion and co-combustion. Present study aims to highlight the common biomass available in Canada such as wheat straw, barley straw, flax straw, timothy grass and pinewood. The biomass samples were collected form Saskatoon, Canada and examined for their physical and chemical characteristics using static bomb calorimeter, XRD, TGA, ICP-MS, CHNSO, FT-IR and FT-NIR. The biomass samples were subjected to three-step extraction process, i.e. hexane, alcohol and water extraction separately, after extraction the raffinate biomass was acid hydrolyzed. The acid soluble fractions, which mainly contained degraded sugars, were analysed by HPLC and the lignin content was determined using acid insoluble fraction. The hexane extract (i.e. waxes), alcohol extract and lignin were characterized by FT-IR spectroscopy. Among all the biomass samples pinewood shows lower ash and lignin content, while shows higher calorific value, cellulose and hemicellulose content. The appreciable amount of hexane soluble in pinewood was due to the presence of terpene hydrocarbons. However among the agricultural biomass samples barley straw shows higher ash, wax and lignin content compared to wheat and flax straw. All these properties combined together have shown that pinewood, wheat and flax can act as the potential candidates for bio-energy production. Crown Copyright (C) 2009 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.