Variables of briquetting process and quality of forestry biomass briquettes

Abstract

In the quest for recovery of waste generated from forest production to the process of industrial transformation of the biomass it was developed the process of briquetting. The cluster of wood particles facilitates the operations of handling of combustible material in addition to concentrating the available energy in terms of volume. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether the raw material affects the quality of the briquette and verify the effect of pressure applied during the mechanical and energy  characteristics of the final product, and to evaluate the behavior of the material mix (MIX) compared to pure materials. The briquettes were produced in a pilot  briquetter, hydraulic piston, 120 °C with a constant pressure of 50 bar for eight minutes and 65, 95 or
130 bar for two minutes. Six briquettes were used for each treatment. The characteristics evaluated were calorific value (GCV), bulk density and compressive strength. The raw material has a greater influence on the quality of briquettes than the compaction pressure. The low pressure is the most suitable for Pinus sp forest biomass briquettes. In this, MIX submitted satisfactory quality of briquettes with PCS 4,773 kcal kg-1, density 1220 kg m-³ and compressive strength of 167 kgf cm-2.

doi: 10.4336/2010.pfb.30.62.101