Gasification characteristics of organic waste by molten salt

Recently, along with the growth in economic development, there has been a dramatic accompanying increase in the amount of sludge and organic waste. The disposal of such is a significant problem. Moreover, there is also an increased in the consumption of electricity along with economic growth. Although new energy development, such as fuel cells, has been promoted to solve the problem of power consumption, there has been little corresponding promotion relating to the disposal of sludge and organic waste. Generally, methane fermentation comprises the primary organic waste fuel used in gasification systems. However, the methane fermentation method takes a long time to obtain the fuel gas, and the quality of the obtained gas is unstable. On the other hand, gasification by molten salt is undesirable because the molten salt in the gasification gas corrodes the piping and turbine blades. Therefore, a gasification system is proposed by which the sludge and organic waste are gasified by molten salt. Moreover, molten carbonate fuel cells (MCFC) are needed to refill the MCFC electrolyte volatilized in the operation. Since the gasification gas is used as an MCFC fuel, MCFC electrolyte can be provided with the fuel gas. This paper elucidates the fundamental characteristics of sludge and organic waste gasification. A crucible filled with the molten salt comprising 62 Li2Co3/38 K2CO3, is installed in the reaction vessel, and can be set to an arbitrary temperature in a gas atmosphere. In this instance, the gasifying agent gas is CO2. Sludge or the rice is supplied as organic waste into the molten salt, and is gasified. The chemical composition of the gasification gas is analyzed by a CO/CO2 meter, a HC meter, and a SOx meter gas chromatography. As a result, although sludge can generate CO and H-2 near the chemical equilibrium value, all of the sulfur in the sludge is not fixed in the molten salt, because the sludge floats on the surface of the carbonate by the specific gravity of sludge lighter than the carbonate, and is not completely converted into CO and H-2. Moreover, the rice also shows good characteristics as a gasifying agent. Consequently, there is high expectation to using the organic waste as a molten salt gasifying agent. However, this requires lengthening the contact time between the organic waste and the molten salt. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All fights reserved.