Production of Bio-oil via Fast Pyrolysis of Cassava Rhizome in a Fluidised-Bed Reactor

This article reports experimental results of fast pyrolysis of cassava rhizome (CR), in a fluidised-bed fast pyrolysis reactor unit incorporated with a hot vapour filter. The objective of this research is to investigate the effect of reaction temperatures on pyrolysis products. Bio-oils as the main product were characterised for their basic properties such as water content, solids content, ash content, density, pH, elemental composition and heating value. Results showed that the optimum pyrolysis temperature was 472 degrees C, which gave maximum bio-oil yield of 63.23 wt% on dry biomass basis. The water, solids and ash contents of the bio-oil were 18 wt%, 0.8 wt% and <0.01 wt%, respectively. Moreover, the density, pH value and the higher heating value (HHV) of the bio-oil were measured to be 1.1 g/ml, 3.1 and 26.9 MJ/kg, respectively. (C) 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd. Selection and/or peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of 2nd International Conference on Advances in Energy Engineering (ICAEE).