The Performances of Fixed and Stirred Bed in Microwave Pyrolysis of Biomass

AbstractThis paper presents for the first time the comparative study between fixed bed (FB) and stirred bed (SB) pyrolysis of biomass in a 1kW and 2.45GHz microwave (MW) system. Generally biomass is poor absorber of MW and pyrolysis reaction cannot takes place unless induced with absorber. However, MW absorber not only the affects the temperature profile but also it initiates the pyrolysis reaction. Interestingly, in SB, approach of varying MW absorber quantity can be a used to control the pyrolysis temperature which otherwise is difficult in domestic MW system. Bio-oil was subjected to FT-IR analysis in order to determine possible chemical functional groups. Overall, SB produced much better results in terms of complete pyrolysis which could save energy, time and cost of the MW pyrolysis process