Performance Optimization of the Gasification Process by using Equilibrium Model and Dragonfly Algorithm
Adityabir Singh, Ranjan Saurav Das · Proceedings of the International Conference on Advances in Energy Research and Applications, ICAERA ... · 2021
The prediction of the working parameters is of importance for the optimum performance of the biomass gasification process.The gasification temperature, the initial moisture content of the biomass and the equivalence ratio are some of the main input parameters which decide the syngas composition and hence the gasification efficiency.Here, a modified equilibrium model based on a single global gasification reaction with equilibrium constants directly obtained from the available empirical relations is used to predict the syngas composition and the equivalence ratio at different values of moisture content and gasification temperature for two different biomasses (rubber wood and saw dust).The present model is relatively simpler than the available ones and is validated against both experimental and numerical data available for rubber wood and saw dust.Thereafter, the present modified model is used to study the variation in syngas composition, equivalence ratio, lower heating value of syngas and coldgas efficiency for different input values of gasification temperature and moisture content.Subsequently, an optimization problem is formulated by taking the ratio of equivalence ratio to the lower heating value of syngas as the objective function.The dragonfly algorithm is used for the optimization of the gasification problem.The maximum possible efficiency is calculated by varying the moisture content in the range of 5% to 25%, for different gasification temperatures varying in the range 800 o C to 1000 o C. The optimization results show that the maximum possible efficiency for rubber wood is 79.85% for 0.374 equivalence ratio and the same for saw dust is 85.00% for 0.302 equivalence ratio corresponding to the lowest gasification temperature and moisture content.