Menu

Challenges with the Biomass Gasification of Coconut Shell

2023-04-04
2023-04-14
  • Fortune Adekogbe

    Good day, @danwbr.

    I am a student and a relatively new user of your open source chemical process simulation software, DWSIM. I appreciate your work and dedication to this project, which has been very useful for me and many others.

    I am currently working on a design project that involves the biomass gasification of coconut shell. I am having trouble with adding the coconut shell as a hypothetical compound and entering its ultimate analysis and proximate analysis details because DWSIM does not seem to have an interface for that. So, I can only enter the elements (C,H,O,N and S) in the ultimate analysis as molecules.

    I have also had some trouble with adding some compounds to the simulation environment, like calcium hydroxide and calcium hypochlorite, because they are not available via any of the options provided such as the thermo/chemicals database or the online database through DWSIM. Also, I have not been able to find an online repository or website where I can get all the data required to define a new compound via the compound creation wizard. Rapeseed oil and Selexol are also fall into this category.

    I envisage problems with some equipment used in the process like a microfilter and a hammer mill but for those ones, I plan to create custom models for them via a python script or excel in the worst-case scenario.

    Do you have any ideas or suggestions for me? I would appreciate any help or guidance you can provide. Thank you for your time and attention.

    Sincerely,
    Fortune - A DWSIM User

     

    Last edit: Fortune Adekogbe 2023-04-04
  • Gregor Reichert

    Gregor Reichert - 2023-04-06

    Hi Fortune,
    to add biomass as new component, this is the way to go! Define it by entering the element composition. But be aware to define all required properties (at least proxy values).

     
    • Fortune Adekogbe

      Thanks, Gregor. Some elements like Hydrogen, Nitrogen and Oxygen only exists on DWSIM in their molecular form. Is it reasonable to instead define the stream with these molecules instead? (by recomputing the coconut shell composition to reflect the fact that 1 molecule represents 2 elements)

      Also, do you have any recommendations about how I can represent like Ca(OH)2, Ca(ClO)2, Rapeseed oil and the Selexol solvent in DWSIM?

       

      Last edit: Fortune Adekogbe 2023-04-06
  • Gregor Reichert

    Gregor Reichert - 2023-04-14

    Hi,
    yes, you should do this either by wizard for solids definition or by compound creator utility. You need to define the elements directely as no UNIFAC or Joback groups can be defined. Therefore you need to define all required properties manually as no Joback groups are definied to do that job for you.

     

Log in to post a comment.