Researchers at the Bio4Energy Group, Borås, Sweden, have shown in pilot-scale experiments that pressurized, entrained-flow gasification may be used to transform biomass from forestry residue to a synthesis gas rich in chemical energy. This is good news for the researchers and their industrial partners who have been developing the method for the purpose of making biofuel with a low environmental footprint and high energy efficiency.

 

 

 

Picture: Bio4Energy researchers Magnus Marklund and Fredrik Weiland at the SP Energy Technology Center at Piteå.  

If the process proves to be as efficient in a future scale-up to commercial levels, it could also be good news for the forestry industry at large, looking to use their residual fiber-based process streams in new products. As an added advantage, it could make forestry residue competitive with black coal in its use in commercial gasification processes for making fuels and chemicals, in terms of cold-gas efficiency. This latter is a measure used by researchers of the chemical energy left in the synthesis gas resulting from the gasification process.