Drying wood waste with a pulse combustion dryer

Conference · Fri Dec 31 04:00:00 EST 1993

OSTI ID:140341

Buchkowski, A G ^[1]; Kitchen, J A ^[2]

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1. Spectrum Engineering Corp., Ltd., Peterborough, Ontario (Canada)
2. John A. Kitchen, Ltd., Hastings, Ontario (Canada)

There is a vast amount of wood waste available to be used as an alternate fuel if its moisture could be reduced efficiently. Tests have been conducted to assess an industrial dryer using pulse combustion as a heating source for drying wood waste; specifically sawdust and pulverized wet hog fuel. Pulse combustion offers the advantage of high heat transfer, efficient combustion, and low NO{sub x} emissions. The material is injected into the exhaust gases in the tailpipe of the combustor which uses natural gas or propane as a fuel. The turbulence created by the pulsations enhance the drying process by reducing the boundary layer thicknesses. The materials is further dried in a rotary drum. The material has been dried without scorching or burning in tests where the inlet moisture content has been as high as 60% on a wet basis. The outlet moisture contents achieved have typically been 10%. Analysis of the test data and cost estimates of the equipment indicate that the pulse combustion drying system is at least comparable to existing systems in terms of operating costs, and offers very significant savings in capital costs. Testing with various other materials such as wood pulp, sludges and peat is continuing to further assess the equipment`s performance.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Lab., Golden, CO (United States)
• OSTI ID: 140341
• Report Number(s): NREL/CP--200-5768-Vol.1; CONF-9308106--Vol.1; ON: DE93010050
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

09 BIOMASS FUELS
COMBUSTORS
DRYERS
DRYING
EMISSION
EXHAUST GASES
MOISTURE
NATURAL GAS
NITROGEN OXIDES
PEAT
PROPANE
PULSE COMBUSTION
RENEWABLE ENERGY SOURCES
RENEWABLE RESOURCES
SLUDGES
WOOD FUELS
WOOD WASTES