3/15/2012
Officially have been shut-down by SD Fire Department due to smoke produced during carbonization process.
Have been focusing on all paperwork due for class. Had final sponsor review on March 13th. Ecolife was happy with progress and enjoyed talked about work we have put in for last 10 weeks.
Time Line for Test Runs (FEEDSTOCK=EUCALYPTUS IN ALL)
2/3/2012 15 Gal 2nd Test
1:20pm Start
1:23pm Exhaust Begins
1:27pm Exhaust Velocity/Density Increase, Exhaust is Moist
1:30pm Exhaust Exhibits Brownish Coloring, Density Increases, Exhaust Temperature Increases- Beginning of Transition Phase
1:37pm Take Lid off and Picture- Pyrolysis almost Complete
1:39pm Exhaust Less Dense (1st notice)
1:42pm Exhaust Decreasing Density, Brownish Color Fades
1:45pm At Chimney Opening Exhaust Almost Clear
1:47pm Clear Exhaust, Kill Propane, Terminate Heat with Water
Notes:
Didn't wait for flame to come out of chimney
Use Uniform Feedstock
Air Vent Control Closed (only air opening from burner access opening)
1/30/2012 15 GAL 1st Test
7:15pm Start
7:17pm Dense Exhaust
7:23pm Exhaust Density/Velocity Increases
7:27pm Exhaust Density Decreases, Exhaust Moisture Decreases
7:28pm Notice Flames in Exhaust, Exhaust Density Decreases-Pyrolysis Almost Complete
7:33pm Exhaust is Clear, Flames Increase Radially/Vertically and more Vigorous Combustion
7:40pm Exhaust Flame Extinguished
7:42pm Kill Propane-Terminate Heat with Water
Notes:
7:25pm Notice Red Glow on Barrel, Paint melting
Air Vent Control fully open (Control 30%)
Charcoal Product Analysis - 2/1/12
Sample: from reactor prototype v1.1 (35 gallon) initial run (1/30/12)
reactor settings: full air
remaining specs of run needed (david has notes)
Method: ASTM Standard D 1762‐84
results:
two samples analyses for volatile content
1) 27% volatile
2) 28% volatile
results are close indicating little experimental error
end -2/1/12
Notes from prior to beginning of the quarter:
Meeting with ecolife - 9/22/11
background:
Aquaponics:
10% of the traditional water required
Veggies on 10% of land
Protect forests:
Conversion to charcoal traditionally is 8% - 15%
Agricultural waste is the target carbon source
Bonus…
Does it cook the way our customer likes?
** not for our project** Want chimney so as to not harm human health, also might want protection from burns
Looking for max efficiency
Fuels: wood, methane gas, charcoal
Some people use methane, other will not
Middle class cooks with charcoal
Rural community makes the charcoal for the cities
Rivers are disappearing as a direct result of deforestation in these area
Create oven to be heated with methanol fuel to fill with agg waste, corn, rice steams. Blabla to make charcoal
Original charcoal in the USA was from cars by ford, Henry started it
Where will this oven be applied: how dothe people live, what resources are there.
Must be vented, recir gases.
Methane provided here for testing. Which will be similar to their methane? Not until ecolife’s digester is up
Main idea, ONE GUY IS COMMUNITY TEACH TO NEXT GUY IN COMMUNITY, CHEAP AND EASY
Then press into bricks.
Amy has done charcoal: MIT, delson knows
80/20 rule, some wood for flavor is allowed
Q and A
Main feedstock, animal waste, veggie wast.
Direct use?
Pyrolysis is what’s happening
High temp might contribute to quality
Char from – leave, corn stalks, maze, rice croap, anything organic.
Cassava for binder
3-4 hours with good temp should be good @ ~1000
Gas storage? Direct use, yes. Possible hook up to balloon for storage.
Website links to come! Sweet!
Main goal, get up to temp!
How to press quickly!
Streach starch out, maybe find another binder.
Possibly get in touch with land fill
Bricks and clay is skilled and ready,
Durability is key!
Dung is readily available
end of meeting - 9/22/11
meeting with delson:
3:30 11/22/11
we run meetings from here out
for report:
become experts on charcoal
what is good charcoal and what is bad charcoal
what effects the process
Rich hurtz: to help maybe. says put in fume hood,, hahahahahaha
contact him.
we need a safety person in our team.
Delson has a materials testing program.
End of meeting with Delson 11/22/11
11/22/11 - Michael’s web hopping notes for Charcoal production in general:
https://wiki.duke.edu/display/engineerswithoutborders/Biomass+Charcoal - detailed hand on experiments from the kids at duke
http://www.agitc.cn/Charcoal.htm - Chinese charcoal and briquetting equipment w/ details
http://biochar.bioenergylists.org/makingcharcoal - good site w/ links for production from leaves and sawdust and much much more
http://www.fao.org/docrep/X5555E/x5555e02.htm - industrial charcoal making - like the big boys!, efficiancy and yield standards, 400 ~ 30% volatile matter content and yield of 42%, 500C~13% volatile and 33%yield. 0.5-6% ash, non-condensible gaseous output has ~10% the calorific value of natural gas. A good commercial charcoal can have a net volatile matter content - (moisture free) of about 30% --->therefore temp of ~400C should meet volatile spec, with best yield.
http://www.biocoal.org/3.html - cheap retort kiln made of bricks, and some links
http://www.flowfarm.org/biochar.html - traditional - stinky fuel charcoal~400F, biochar ~ 400-500C, pyrolisis chamber tmep should be ~450 to 550 C, combustion temp 1200-1500C.
Antal - High Yield Biomass Charcoal - claims that increased pressure to 0.4 Mpa and slightly moist biomass increases yield. really high efficiency such as this paper will prob be out of the question due to unskilled labor and limited materials, however, this paper is to show an upper limit of what can be achieved
Antal - Review of Methods for Improving the Yield of Charcoal - ~30% volatiles is desired for food charcoal, near zero volatiles is ideal for blast furnace charcoal
ASTM Standard D 1762‐84 - standard method for moister,volatiles, and ash
http://www.fao.org/docrep/X5328e/x5328e00.htm - Simple technologies for charcoal making
Properly constructed and operated brick kilns are without doubt one of the most effective methods of charcoal production.
The ability of the brick kiln to conserve the heat of carbonisation is an important factor in its high conversion efficiency of wood to charcoal.
The white smoke continues for some days (depending on the water content) and then starts to become blue, showing effective carbonization is in process... When the carbonization process is completed the smoke becomes almost as transparent as hot air
The total number of kilns at one centre must be limited to 35 or 42 due to the fumes from the chimneys as, although not harmful to health, these fumes irritate eyes and lungs. Charcoal manufacturing centres should therefore be located at least two km away from villages. The prevailing wind direction should also be taken into consideration.... WTF i though the fumes were harmful?
http://chuck-wright.com/calculators/stack_effect.html - stack effect calculator
11/23/11 - Michael’s notes for gas burner desgin
http://www.backyardmetalcasting.com/oliverburner1.html - Oliver - upwind
random cool shit -
http://cturare.tripod.com/cond.htm - stie about producer gas cleaning for engine use
http://asae.frymulti.com/abstract.asp?aid=26518&t=2 - engine run paper claiming simple cyclone fabrication
http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/T0512E/T0512e00.htm#Contents - shouold have everything
11/24/11 - Michael first attempt at producing charcoal, using standard youtube method of nested barrels - 1 gallon ?retort? (reaction vessel) inside of a ~2 or 3 gallon drum. air slits added to base of drum, and chiminey placed atop. feedstock was a mixture of dry 2X4 blolcks and unseasoned eucaliptus bark,leaves,and branches and gardian newspapers.
filled larger (2X4 and branches) at base of reactor, working up to top with twigs and newspaper atop. began fire with emburs of previous beach goers fire, once burning placed chimney and notes stack effect. smokey at chimney but flame seen at top of barrel for first for ~30 min. red glow obserbed on side walls of barrel and flame worked down to base. check chimney exhause for flamibility conrfirmed! intensity of radiand head increase for next 30~60min. with flame seen at chimney and no smoke condition seen at periods. red glow, radiant heat, began to drop off and affer 30~ of decreasing heat felt only red glow seen alot base and very low to no smoke seen atop chinmey. poured i ece and water into barrel to kill activity. once cooled by second water dump, pulled inner barrel to reviel good charcoal. samples kept along wti ha control sample from the original fire in pit
11/25/11 - Michael’s Volatiles content tests:
Left charcoal in oven at 130C over night to ensure dry. losely followed ASTM D1762-84 for volatile content. no lids, minimal cooling periods. slight flame seen in samples during heat up (bad). after 6 min in back of oven, oven temp has only recoved back to 800 since oven door open preheat period. left in oven past 6 min, until temp reached 950
equipment needed to properly preform test: crucibles with lids, better mill (mortor and pecil used), No 20 (850 micron) sieve for too large particle check and No. 100 (150 micron)sieve for too small particle check
3 sample: 2X4 (from either inner or outer - sample mixing error occured in transite), bark from inner barrel, and control all measured to 1 gram
control:1g added, final = 20.43, crucible weight = 20.00g, so, volatile content = 57%
2x4:1g added, final = 18.26, crucible weight = 17.76g, so volatile content = 50%
bark:1g added, final = 17.95, crucible weight = 17.4, so volatile content = 44%
*note* sp/flame occured in preheat so some of lose was of charcoal mass burning.
run two: w/ suito lid and sieved through 400micron held on 200micron
control: crucible weight = 36.25, added 1 g = 37.25, final weight = 36.91, volatile = 34%
bark: crucible weight = 37.76, added 1 g = 38.76, final weight = 38.61, volatile = 15%
2x4: crucible weight = 34.70, added 1 g = 35.70, final weight = 35.50, volatile = 19%
*note: lid of empty crucible atop working crucible seems to have worked, slight very slight charring seen at edges of samples, assuming less then 0.5% of volume effected
11/26/11 - Michael’s nested barrel run two: simlar to first test run, retort loaded with fresh palm bark, twigs, algae cake, goldfish snack food, saw dust.
11/28/11- DAVID:
Naphthalene is a byproduct of Coal Tar production (pyrolysis of carbon goods). Naphthalene (C10H8) is a possible carcinogen and can turn into an explosive mixture with addition of air. This will be the main issue of our gas ventilation as this is the flammable gas byproduct that Ecolife was talking about recirculating back into our oven to increase efficiency.
We will want some sort of cooling ventilation with a low pressure drop that will condense naphthalene and other flammable byproducts in order to collect hazardous waste and dispose of properly.
If we want to recirculate this flammable gas, MORE research is needed to see what happens when these gaseous byproducts are burned.
BIOGAS BLEND: We will be using a mixture of Nitrogen with either Natural Gas (consisting mainly of Methane) or Propane. This will want to imitate the desired heating range of typical biogas. MUST Find heating range of our Biogas!
website for biogas from cow dung...
http://www.habmigern2003.info/biogas/methane-digester.html
website for Heating Values of Various Gases (incl. Biogas)
http://www.hrt.msu.edu/energy/pdf/heating%20value%20of%20common%20fuels.pdf
11/29/11 - Michael’s reading notes:
Demirbas - Biomass t Charcoal, Liquid, Gaseous Products Via Carbonization Process
when refering to wood, pyrolysis is also called carbonization, wood distillation, or destructive distillation. name usually choose by desired primery product: carbonization = char, wood distillation = liquid
starch used for bricks. 75% to 25% water/starch (20%water, 5% starch)
advantags of charcoal in heating:
low surlfur content
high carbon to ash ratio
few unreactive inorganic impurities
porous structure with large surface area
little smoke discharge
activated charcoal SA = 300 to 2,000 m^2, holy shit!
possible analysis:
ASTM D1103-80: Elemental composition
ASTM D2015: heating value (bomb calorimetry)
11/30/11 - michael’s reading notes
notes from Wood’s paper
wood - The material left behind is a black, porous
charcoal that retains the original form of the wood but has just one fifth the
weight, one half the volume, and about one third the original energy
content (55, 56). Despite the large net energy loss, however, charcoal
typically has a calorific value of 32-33 MJ/kg, compared to the original
wood's value of 18-19 MJ/kg
also, good tables about kenya
transportation energy discussion
also, quotes of kenya wood and charcoal uses
Risk Reduction Presentation:
Overview of the Problem Definition
- just oven, charing device
Functional Requirements (F.R.s) and Constraints of project.
-
High Risk Areas
-
Team Risk Reduction Achievements.
Design Solutions under consideration. Make sure to use annotated sketches or CAD.
Remaining questions and unresolved issues
Project Management for next quarter:
Milestones with specific objectives and dates
Topics for each member's individual component analysis
List of workshops team members will enroll in
Gantt chart of 156B quarter
Bring your team binder and hand it to the instructor during your presentation (it will be returned that evening).
lit search at thomasnet.
searched for sieves: 126 hits: http://www.thomasnet.com/products/sieves-75170209-1.html
serached for crucibles: 135 hits -
searchedc for lab crucibles: 23 hits -
1/9/12 - michael’s individual component notes: astm method materials: fisher, cole polmer...ebay
1)crucible
fisher - FB-965-E - http://www.fishersci.com/ecomm/servlet/itemdetail?catalogId=29104&productId=13124602&distype=0&fromSearch=0&storeId=10652&langId=-1
cole -
2)crucible cover (need to call and confirm fit)
3)calcium cloride desiccant
cole -
ebay -
lab -
4)sieves
ebay - #20
ebay - #100
The ability to analytically test and equate different produced samples of charcoal will inevitably be key to dirrecting the project towards success. the following analysis to to provide a knowledge of the requried purchases to bring the team to a position to analytically determine the quality of the machines output charcoal.
upon arrival of the requested items, the team will be able to fully analyse the compsition of our produced charcoal. the analysis will consist of moister content, volatile content, and ash content.