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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 73 records · Page 4
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2023

Design of an Integrated Solids Handling System to Maximize Syngas Process Reliability (Cooperative Research and Development Final Report)

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), in partnership with Wonderful Renewable Energy (WRE) and Idaho National Laboratory (INL), plans to develop a general methodology for designing integrated biorefinery solids preprocessing, handling, and feeding systems based on the chemical, physical, and mechanical attributes of the starting biomass material. This attribute-driven approach will include detailed feedstock property measurements, iterative computational modeling, and bench-scale testing to design systems for preprocessing, handling, and reactor in-feed, up to and including the selection of the conversion reactor. The initial tests and system design will be conducted using waste material from almond and pistachio growing and production operations (shells, hulls, and wood), targeting the conversion of this material to syngas for electricity production. The methodology will then be generalized to other feedstocks. The purpose of this project is to design an integrated solids handling system to maximize the process reliability of converting almond and pistachio waste to electricity. The design methodology and workflow developed from this example will then be applied to the Feedstock Conversion Interface Consortium (FCIC) benchmark loblolly pine residues, thus demonstrating the robustness of the overall design approach and providing insight and guidance for future conversion systems. V-Grid Energy Systems was brought on as a subcontractor to provide gasifiers and labor to complete gasifier runs.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Enhancing the shredder durability for biomass preprocessing by utilizing wear-resistant cutter materials

Shredders are widely used to reduce biomass feedstock size through the shearing action of the cutter teeth that are susceptible to wear. A series of wear tests using a custom-built shredder was conducted on corn stover feedstock with three cutter materials: a conventional D2 tool steel, iron boriding as a candidate surface treatment, and M42 tool steel as a candidate alloy. Wear tests showed that the iron borided D2 steel significantly increased the tool life compared with the non-treated D2 and M42. Although the M42 cutters initially exhibited less wear than the D2 cutters, the benefit faded as preprocessing progressed. In conclusion, the experimental results demonstrated that the durability of shredder cutters can be substantially improved by applying more wear-resistant tool materials.

09 - BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2023

Comparative Techno-Economic Analysis of Available Feedstocks for High-Temperature Conversion: Whole Tree Thinnings and Mature Pine Residues

The techno-economic and life cycle implications of utilizing low-cost feedstocks in a high temperature conversion process are of great interest. Here, we investigate the conversion cost impacts of two underutilized feedstocks from the commercial pine industry: 13-year-old whole trees, representing trees removed for the purpose of precommercial thinning, and 23-year-old pine residues, representing a waste stream produced from the deconstruction of mature trees for other purposes. Experimental fast pyrolysis (FP) yields for each feedstock were adjusted to a catalytic fast pyrolysis (CFP) basis and used to estimate process economics by employing published correlations based on rigorous techno-economic modeling. These correlations were used in tandem with results from supply and preprocessing analyses to evaluate the field-to-fuel economics of each feedstock. A small difference in minimum fuel selling price (MFSP) was found between the conversion costs for the two feedstocks, with 23-year-old residues demonstrating a net benefit of $0.27 per gasoline gallon equivalent (GGE) compared to the 13- year-old whole tree thinnings, driven primarily by feedstock supply costs. This suggests that both whole tree thinnings and pine residues may be viable feedstock options for CFP conversion. Life cycle inventories (LCIs) were also generated for each case, enabling a field-to-fuel quantification of the cost and carbon cycle associated with each feedstock.

catalytic fast pyrolysis↗
DOE OSTI2021

BETO 2021 Peer Review - Rational Design of Robust Reactor Feeding Systems for Heterogeneous Cellulosic and Agricultural Wastes Based on Biomass Quality Characteristics

Consistent and reliable preprocessing, conveyance, and reactor in-feed systems, particularly for low-cost waste feedstocks, remains a major technical challenge for the emerging Bioeconomy. By identifying critical biomass attributes and connecting them to flow and conversion behavior, science-driven system designs can address these often-overlooked solids handling challenges. The Wonderful Company (TWC) is the world's largest almond and pistachio grower, generating 250,000 dry tons/year of waste material including hulls, shells, and wood (>5 million tons/year industry wide in the U.S.). This project seeks to turn this environmental and economic liability into a sustainable and profitable resource, targeting conversion via gasification to syngas for electricity and bio-char, by addressing related material handling and feeding challenges. Based on optimized preprocessing strategies, bulk material flow, and thermal conversion properties, an overall system design will be developed. The methodology will be tested with FCIC's benchmark loblolly pine residues, to demonstrate the robustness of the overall approach and provide insight and guidance for future systems. The project will culminate in extended field trials to demonstrate an improved continuous feeding system with a commercial biomass-to-electricity gasifier vendor, and an economic analysis demonstrating a reduction in electricity production costs by maximizing on-stream time while minimizing preprocessing and CapEx costs.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗
DOE OSTI2024

Woody Feedstock 2022 State of Technology Report

The U.S. Department of Energy promotes production of advanced liquid transportation fuels from lignocellulosic biomass by funding fundamental and applied research that advances the state of technology (SOT). As part of its involvement in this mission, Idaho National Laboratory completes an annual SOT report for n th -plant and 1 st -plant woody biomass feedstock logistics. The purpose of the SOT is to provide the status of feedstock supply system technology development for woody biomass to biofuels relative to technical targets and cost goals from specific design cases, based on data and experimental results. Conventional feedstock supply systems need to be modified to meet the demands of conversion pathways, specifically to have the ability to adjust the quality of the raw biomass materials. Advanced systems incorporate innovative methods of material handling, preprocessing and supply chain configuration. In advanced designs, variability of the raw biomass can be reduced to produce feedstocks of a uniform format, moving toward biomass commoditization. Against this backdrop, the 2022 Woody SOT for low-ash woody feedstocks utilizes feedstock fractionation by incorporating technologies that can separate the biomass into its anatomical fractions (wood, bark, needle, and extrinsic ash) to reduce impurities and attempt to maximize the retention of usable fractions that satisfy downstream quality considerations. By using a series of air classification steps, this strategy can reduce the extrinsic ash in forest residues, separate out a majority of the incoming needles (which can be supplied to alternate markets), and maximize the retention of whitewood in the usable fraction. The fractionated forest residues are then mixed with clean-pine chips in a 50-50 blend to prepare the feedstock for the desired conversion pathway. The n th -plant analysis estimated the delivered cost for the feedstock at $\$$69.23/dry ton (2016$\$$) which represents a $\$$6.64/dry ton decrease compared to the cost estimate of the 2021 Woody SOT supply system for low-ash woody feedstocks. The quality requirements in the 2022 Woody SOT were identical to those of the 2021 Woody SOT at = 1.00 wt % ash and = 50.51 wt% carbon. The cost savings derive primarily from reductions in dry matter losses during air classification. The GHG emissions for the n th -plant analysis were estimated at 178.39 kg CO2e/dry ton compared to 178.71 kg CO 2 e/dry ton in the 2021 Woody SOT, a decrease of 0.32 kg CO2e/dry ton. The small change stems from an increase in emissions attributed to preprocessing and slightly larger savings in emissions from transportation. In the 1 st -plant analysis of the 2022 Woody SOT system, the average throughput was estimated to be approximately 2,128 dry tons/day or 96.51% of the name plate capacity. During the simulation the daily throughput ranged from 1,090 dry tons/day to 2,200 dry tons/day, or 49.43% to 99.75% of the daily nameplate capacity. After the year of operation 722,403 tons of processed feedstock were produced in total without regard to quality considerations (99.64% of the annual nameplate capacity). The variability in throughput was primarily caused by equipment failures in the system. Regular failures, downtime caused by routine maintenance per manufacturer guidelines, contributed to a majority 62.50% of failures and 62.60% of downtime. Failures due to wear were the other cause of disruption within the system, impacting the rotary shear and orbital screen and accounting for 37.50% of the failures and 37.40% of the total downtime. Ultimately the system was on stream for 87.84% during the simulation period, which is only 2.16 percentage points below the nth-plant assumption for on-stream time. The production cost of the system averaged $\$$71.66/dry ton. The costs ranged from a minimum of $\$$71.23/dry ton to a maximum of $\$$2,115.30/dry ton. When dry matter losses (disposed low-quality fractions as well as other losses such as in grinders) were considered the costs increased to an average of $\$$75.11/dry ton with a minimum of $\$$74.69/dry ton and a maximum of $\$$2,136.86/dry ton...

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Herbaceous Feedstock 2020 (State of Technology Report)

The Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007 required a minimum supply of 36 million gallons of renewable fuels per year by 2022. In order to achieve these goals, the Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) has set cost and technology targets for producing advanced and cellulosic biofuels. One of the targets is to validate feedstock supply infrastructures and systems with 90% overall operating effectiveness and field-to-reactor throat delivered cost less than $85.51/dry ton (2016). As stated by the 2017 Multi-Year Program Plan (DOE 2017), the research and development focus of the Feedstock Technologies (FT) platform is reducing the cost, improving the supply chain logistic efficiency, improving biomass quality, and increasing the supply volume. In addition, BETO oversees annual State of Technology (SOT) report that assesses current technologies that are relevant to BETO’s targets based on actual data and experimental results. Feedstocks are essential to achieving BETO goals because the cost, quality, and quantity of feedstock available and accessible at any given time limit the maximum volume of biofuels that can be produced. In accordance with the 2016 Multi-Year Program Plan (DOE 2016a), FT focuses on (1) reducing the delivered cost of sustainably produced biomass, (2) preserving and improving the physical and chemical quality parameters of harvested biomass to meet the individual needs of biorefineries and other biomass users, and (3) expanding the quantity of feedstock materials accessible to the bioenergy industry. This is done by identifying, developing, demonstrating, and validating efficient and economical integrated systems for harvest and collection, storage, handling, transport, and preprocessing raw biomass from a variety of crops to reliably deliver the required supplies of high-quality, affordable feedstocks to biorefineries as the industry expands. The elements of cost, quality, and quantity are key considerations when developing advanced feedstock supply concepts and systems (DOE 2016a).

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Torrefaction of Sorted MSW Pellets for Uniform Biopower Feedstock

The project objective is to use advanced compositional and thermophysical characterization methods from INL to support the evaluation of new production pathways (partnered with MTU) to biopower applications under the guidance of an industrial partner operating the in U.S. power sector (CE). Ultimately, this project aims to create a uniform feedstock from non-recyclable wastes that can be used in bioenergy and biomaterials, which torrefaction and preprocessing strategies are critical to achieving this goal.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2024

ChemPren: a new and economical technology for conversion of waste plastics to light olefins

With the ever-increasing demand for plastics, sustainable recycling methods are key necessities. Here, the current plastics industry can manage to recycle only 10% of the 400 million metric tons of plastic produced globally. Waste plastics, in the current infrastructure, land up mostly in landfills. Although a lot of research efforts have been spent on processing and recycling co-mingled mixed plastics, energy-efficient sustainable and scalable routes for plastic upcycling are still lacking. Catalytic valorization of waste plastic feedstock is one of the potential scalable routes for plastic upcycling. Silica-alumina based materials, and zeolites have shown a lot of promise. A major interest lies in restricting catalyst deactivation, and refining product selectivity and yield for such catalytic processes. This article highlights ChemPren technology as a clean energy solution to waste plastic recycling. Co-mingled, mixed plastic feedstock along with spray dried, attrition resistant, ZSM-5 containing catalysts is preprocessed with an extruder to form optimally sized particles and fed into a fluidized bed reactor for short contact times to produce selectively and in high yields ethylenes, propylenes and butylenes. This techno-economic perspective indicates that the ChemPren technology can produce propylene at $\$$0.16 per lb, whereas the current selling price of virgin propylene is $0.54 per lb. This technology can serve as a platform for mixed plastic upcycling, with more advancements necessary in the form of robust and resilient catalysts and reactor operation strategies for tuning product selectivity.

25 - ENERGY STORAGE↗
DOE OSTI2023

Air Classification of Forest Residue for Tissue and Ash Separation Efficiency

The goal of this Case Study was to evaluate the performance of air classification of logging residues toward meeting conversion CMAs for carbon and ash contents, as compared to the static status quo Base Case system in which the residues are first dried and then ground in a hammer mill with a 6 mm screen and fines less than 1.18 mm are removed. Also considered were moisture and ash impacts on throughput and Overall Operating Effectiveness (OOE), as well as delivered feedstock cost and minimum fuel selling price (MFSP). Laboratory data on the impacts of fan speed and moisture content on the separation efficiency of soil ash, needles and bark from white wood were received from FCIC Subtask 5.2: Preprocessing, High Temperature Conversion Preprocessing (Jordan Klinger and Tiasha Bhattacharjee, INL). Average throughput and energy consumption data were obtained from the Bioenergy Feedstock National User Facility (BFNUF) (Neal Yancey, INL) for the same air classifier. These data were utilized to develop the necessary response surface equations to perform throughput analysis using discrete event simulation. Feedstock-Conversion Interface Consortium. Because the Base Case status quo system utilizes drying prior to grinding, we modeled the Case Study with drying prior to air classification and subsequent grinding of the separated white wood to isolate the individual quality and cost impacts of air classification relative to the Base Case system.

CMA↗
DOE OSTI2023

Chapter Four—MSW characterization and preprocessing for biofuels and bioproducts

The organic fraction of MSW (OFMSW) has a high carbohydrate and lipid content, indicating its good potential as a feedstock for bioethanol and biodiesel production. However, variability in feedstock composition for MSW is a critical challenge for downstream conversion processes such as pyrolysis, gasification, incineration, and biotechnological conversion. MSW characterization is critical to inform and optimize the design of physical handling processes to minimize costs and environmental impacts, and improve the downstream conversion performance of MSW materials. Here, this book chapter focuses on current MSW characterization and preprocessing technologies and discusses the costs, benefits, and environmental impacts associated with MSW preprocessing. Also, the book chapter outlines the potential strategies to increase total revenue and mitigate negative environmental impacts for MSW recycling systems.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Feedstock Harvesting and Storage: Post-Harvest Management for Quality Preservation

Research on harvesting, collection, and storage has matured, and our understanding of feedstock supply challenges has led us to the point of our current goals. The goals of this project include using storage time to collect impactful data of critical feedstock properties in storage and to characterize the feedstock before delivery. This data will inform delivery scheduling of biomass and relevant compositional information to minimize variations in the material quality, which are critical to the preprocessing and conversion performance.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Biomass Attributes and Attribute Modifications Affecting Systems and Methods to Separate and Fractionate

Chemical and physical heterogeneity in biomass feedstocks such as agricultural or forestry residues is due to substantial differences in plant tissue types. These differences can contribute significant challenges to handling, preprocessing, and conversion in biorefining processes. An understanding of this chemical and physical heterogeneity can be used to inform fractionation technologies that could facilitate more streamlined processing and potentially be employed to yield multiple co-product streams for a single feedstock. In this chapter, the motivation and scope of biomass fractionation is first outlined. Physical and chemical properties of biomass feedstocks, along with their distribution and diversity within plants, are next discussed with respect to how these differences can be exploited in a fractionation process. A summary of some of the key physical principles that allow for fractionation is next covered along with how these physical principles are exploited in equipment designs. Examples from the literature are briefly discussed that highlight how these approaches can be employed to achieve processing objectives. Several case studies on physical fractionation of corn stover and forestry residues are presented that illustrate how integrated fractionation processes could be employed. Lastly, prospects and potential economic drivers for adoption of biomass fractionation technologies are discussed.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Biomass Attributes and Attribute Modifications Affecting Systems and Methods to Separate and Fractionate. In: Handbook of Biorefinery Research and Technology

Chemical and physical heterogeneity in biomass feedstocks such as agricultural or forestry residues is due to substantial differences in plant tissue types. These differences can contribute significant challenges to handling, preprocessing, and conversion in biorefining processes. An understanding of this chemical and physical heterogeneity can be used to inform fractionation technologies that could facilitate more streamlined processing and potentially be employed to yield multiple co-product streams for a single feedstock. In this chapter, the motivation and scope of biomass fractionation is first outlined. Physical and chemical properties of biomass feedstocks, along with their distribution and diversity within plants is next discussed with respect to how these differences can be exploited in a fractionation process. A summary of some of the key physical principles that allow for fractionation is next covered along with how these physical principles are exploited in equipment designs. Examples from the literature are briefly discussed that highlight how these approaches can be employed to achieve processing objectives. Several case studies on physical fractionation of corn stover and forestry residues are presented that illustrate how integrated fractionation processes could be employed. Finally, prospects and potential economic drivers for adoption of biomass fractionation technologies are discussed.

Biomass chemical properties↗
DOE OSTI2025

Understanding the impacts of inorganic species in woody biomass for preprocessing and pyrolysis–A review

Woody biomass represents an abundant resource for sustainable biofuels, biochemicals, and bioproducts. Technologies for converting woody biomass have been established for decades, and research consistently highlights the critical role of inorganic species and ash plays in feedstock handling and conversion processes, including equipment plugging, corrosion, and catalyst deactivation. A thorough understanding of the variability, transport behavior, and downstream impact of inorganic species in woody biomass is essential for defining feedstock quality specifications and developing effective management strategies for conversion processes. This review compiles critical information in five main sections: 1) inorganic species concentration in woody biomass, based on anatomical fractions and their sources of variability; 2) technique features for quantifying inorganic elemental chemical analysis; 3) impacts of inorganic species on biomass preprocessing; 4) impacts of inorganic species on pyrolysis, and 5) mitigation strategies. Additionally, this review explores future challenges and opportunities in addressing the impacts of inorganic species on biomass quality. These insights aim to support the sustainable development of the biomass-to-bioenergy pipeline and ensure high-quality lignocellulosic feedstocks for efficient downstream conversions. The findings offer valuable guidance to policy makers, industry stakeholders, and researchers in developing effective strategies for managing inorganic species in woody biomass and fostering the sustainable processes for lignocellulosic biorefineries.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Value proposition of coatings or new alloys on hammer wear

The goal of this Case Study was to elucidate the value of improving of the life of parts that wear within a system in terms of the additional material cost that it takes to reach the level of improvement. We recognize that the failure limits and system performance are representative of a single system that may or may not exist in the real world, however, our goal of this project was not to provide an answer for a specific system or to provide a full understanding the economics of all potential systems. The analysis was performed using relative changes from the base alloy cost and considered relative improvements in part life in order to generalize the comparison without referencing specific alloys or coatings that might be employed. Ultimately, this work provides a first check of the potential for improving wear characteristics of grinder hammers to provide a meaningful and impactful benefit to biomass preprocessing and conversion systems. Key takeaways include: • Increasing the life of hammers by 3× provides a delivered feedstock cost benefit of approximately $\$2.25$/dry ton assuming that the relative cost of the hammer material of construction is not increased. • The feasible area of relative hammer cost increase ranges from 110% to 122% of the relative life increase, i.e., a 3× life increase can cost 3.66× the cost of the original hammers • Beyond a 3× increase in relative hammer life, little economic benefit is realized • Even when moisture impacts are included, the relationship between relative hammer cost and relative hammer life was reduced only slightly to a range of 108% to 116% • From the simulation we would expect delivered feedstock costs to be within ±$1.10/dry ton, based on the uncertainty analysis

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Dynamic Life-Cycle Analysis of Fast Pyrolysis Biorefineries: Impacts of Feedstock Moisture Content and Particle Size

The commercialization of biorefineries has been met with significant obstacles due to the technical difficulties of handling solid biomass feedstocks, which are highly variable in physical properties and chemical compositions. An understanding of the principles of unit operations along the supply chain is key to the success of the biofuel industry. This study applies a dynamic life-cycle analysis (DLCA) methodology by developing quantitative relationships between the inputs and outputs for each unit operation based on scientific understanding of the causal effects. Using the DLCA, we assessed system sustainability of drop-in fuel production from fast pyrolysis of pine residues followed by hydro-processing. Life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions were calculated for 4641 runs involving two key feedstock parameters: moisture content after field drying and particle size of the feed to pyrolyzer. Moisture contents varied between 25% and 35%, while particle sizes varied between 0.5 and 5 mm in these runs. The life-cycle GHG emissions of these cases vary from 22 to 40 g/MJ. Close examination of each unit operation's contribution to the total GHG emissions reveals that low moisture content after field drying produces savings in energy consumption during feedstock transportation and on-site drying. However, although small particle size leads to overall higher fuel yield, it also requires a significant amount of energy for feedstock size reduction and fuel production. The energy penalty outweighs the benefit of increased fuel yields, especially when fine particles (<1 mm) are used for pyrolysis; thus, small particle size leads to increased GHG emissions overall. The results highlight the trade-offs between the energy demand for preprocessing and the conversion yields, which can be addressed with DLCA.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2019

Lignin valorization process control under feedstock uncertainty through a dynamic stochastic programming approach

The randomness introduced by reactants is an issue when processing renewable bioresources. In this paper, we apply tools from dynamic stochastic programming theory to the biochemical process. Instead of introducing extra preprocessing units, we consider the inherent randomness of the process and optimize in expectation the performance of the system. In a general setting, this is a multistage stochastic optimization problem and we investigate its approximate solution via two approaches, namely stochastic dual dynamic programming (SDDP) and the finite state, finite action Markov decision process (MDP) framework. These two methods are implemented to a case study of lignin valorization that is crucial to a cost-effective biorefinery process using biomass as the feedstock.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2025

Quantifying Impacts of Biomass Pelletization on Fast Pyrolysis Using a Single-Particle Reactor, X-ray Computed Tomography, and Computational Modeling

The pore structure and density of lignocellulosic feedstocks dictate intraparticle transport phenomena and thereby play an important role in thermochemical conversion processes such as fast pyrolysis for biofuel and biochemical production. Variations in microstructure are inherent from different biomass species and can be introduced by preprocessing techniques such as cutting and pelletization. Morphological changes also occur during conversion and lead to vastly different pore structures and behavior during pyrolysis, which impact required conversion times and product distributions. The current work presents a comprehensive comparison of fast pyrolysis of neat and pelletized pine feedstocks, which includes single-particle experiments, modeling, and 3D imaging by X-ray computed tomography (XCT). The particle-scale model included anisotropic heat and mass transport in a shrinking particle with pyrolysis reactions based on the CRECK mechanism with boundary conditions informed by reactor-scale simulations of the single-particle reactor. The models were validated by measurements of the temperature and mass loss from single-particle pyrolysis experiments of neat and pelletized pine. Quantitative analysis of XCT geometries revealed that pyrolytic conversion yielded chars with increased porosity and permeability compared to the unpyrolyzed materials, along with decreased tortuosity and anisotropy. Pelletization of the pine feedstock resulted in a much denser, less permeable material, which converted slower and produced more residual char after pyrolysis compared to neat pine. The results from particle modeling revealed that accounting for the dynamic and anisotropic heat and mass transport caused by differences in pore structure is critical to achieving agreement with experimental results. Overall, this study highlights the dramatic differences in conversion behavior imparted by pelletization and the importance of capturing microstructural attributes in computational models to guide the design and optimization of pyrolysis processes for specific biomass feedstocks.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗