International Journal of Engineering Trends and Technology- Volume3 Issue1- 2012
Co-Gasification of Coal, Biomass and Plastic
Wastes – An Overview
J. Jegan, T. Bhagavathi Pushpa*, S. Praveen
Department of Civil Engineering, Anna University of Technology Madurai, Ramanathapuram Campus,
Ramanathapuram, TN, India.
1. INTRODUCTION
Coal gasification [15] was the most important
method for synthesis gas production from coal. Some
processes have achieved commercial success on an
industrial scale over the past several decades.
Waste production is a very important problem
in all countries especially in developed countries.
Within these wastes, plastic wastes have great
importance due to the increase of production in latest
years. In the past, plastic materials were not recycled
due to high costs. Technology must find a feasible
process which allows plastic waste to be reused and/or
recycled in an environmental way.
Coal is a major source of energy, accounting
for ~25% of the world energy supplies and ~40% of the
world electricity generation. It is predicted that coal
will continue to play an important role in meeting the
world’s increasing energy demands in the foreseeable
future. However, the use of coal faces several
challenges. The major one is the considerable emission
of CO2, SOx and NOx, which leads to climate change
and air pollution.
Biomass as the solar energy stored in
chemical form in plant and animal materials is among
the most precious and versatile resources on earth. It
provides not only food but also energy, building
materials, paper, fabrics, medicines and chemicals.
Biomass has been used for energy purposes ever since
man discovered fire. Today, biomass fuels can be
utilized for tasks ranging from heating the house to
fuelling a car and running a computer.
Co-gasification of coal with other less carbon
containing fuels, such as natural gas, coke oven gas,
biomass and waste plastics with the aid of oxygen and
steam, is considered to be a promising technology to
reduce such emissions, even in dealing with high ash
content coals and has been extensively investigated.
Co-gasification of biomass and coal has been proposed
as a bridge between energy production based on fossil
fuels and energy production based on renewable fuels.
The co-gasification can not only reduce the cost of the
ISSN: 2231-5381 http://www.ijettjournal.org
feedstock but also reduce the problems that occur in
plant operation due to the production of tar.
The depletion of natural gas resources has
increased the necessity for reducing the consumption of
Natural gas. Thus, biomass and coal are considered as
potential feed stocks for the supply of syngas (CO and
H2) used in the synthesis of liquid fuels by
gasification.
2. TREATMENT OF PLASTIC WASTE
The amount reduction of plastic waste can be
achieved in different ways: a) reducing plastic amount
in products without getting worse features of products;
reusing materials; b) turning plastics which cannot be
reused into other products with other applications in
different industrial sectors.
Within the alternatives of plastic waste
treatment, the most used one is dumping as the
cheapest, but it is the worst one in terms of
environment. Another possibility is the energy use of
plastics directly, e.g., incineration, due to the high
energy content of the raw material. However more
interesting alternatives are the mechanical and
chemical recycling. The mechanical recycling is the
most interesting because it allows plastic to be used as
raw material in other plastic products. In Fig. 1 the
stages of mechanical recycling are shown. However,
this type of recycling is only feasible in products
formed by one kind of plastics or special mixtures, so a
good separation and identification of each component
is necessary.
When mechanical recycling is not possible,
chemical recycling technologies can be used and
plastic waste are converted into different products
through several chemical processes to break down. In
general, the goal is to obtain hydrogen or light
hydrocarbons which can be used as energy products or
raw materials. The advantage of chemical recycling is
that previous plastic separation is not necessary. For
instance, in gasification process; municipal solid
wastes are treated together, avoiding separating plastics
[16].
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