British Chemists explore gasification of biomass in supercritical water.

[NNadir]

Here is another exciting approach to the production of natural gas like fuels from biomass, supercritical water, supercritical water being water at such high temperature and pressure that it is neither gas nor liquid.

Hydrothermal gasification processes are currently being investigated both as a waste treatment process and as a means of energy and materials recovery from biomass and biodegradable organic wastes. The supercritical water gasification process has advantages compared to conventional gasification, in that higher gasification efficiencies at much lower temperatures of approximately 400 °C are achieved. Since the process takes place at high pressure, smaller reactor volumes can be used and the resultant pressurized gas product can be stored directly in pressurized storage tanks resulting in a significant energy saving.1 Water near or above its critical point of temperature 374 °C and pressure 22.1 MPa has unique features with respect to its density, dielectric constant, ion product, viscosity, diffusivity, electric conductance, and solvent ability compared to ambient water.2-6 The vapor and liquid phases become indistinguishable, and the water behaves as a dense gas with a consequent removal of any interphase mass transport processes. Organic compounds have high solubilities and complete miscibility with supercritical water.4-6

This article is from the ASAP section of the scientific journal Energy and Fuels. The abstract is found here: http://pubs.acs.org/cgi-bin/abstract.cgi/enfuem/asap/abs/ef0503055.html

There is considerable interest in the use of biomass as a renewable fuel which can be utilized in a range of energy conversion technologies and which also has the added advantage of being CO2-neutral...

...There is interest in the use of novel technologies which can convert biomass into useful fuels for the future. Supercritical water gasification of biomass has been shown to produce high conversion rates to a gas composed mainly of hydrogen and carbon dioxide with, in addition, carbon monoxide and C1-C4 hydrocarbons.7,8 The production of high concentrations of hydrogen gas has led to much research into this conversion technology as a route to produce the fuel from a renewable source for the hydrogen economy. Biomass consists of mainly the polymers cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin.

[bananas]

1. Speaking of gasification ....

how's your weight-loss program going?

[NNadir]

2. Much better than your attempt to find someone who has been...

...injured by so called "dangerous nuclear waste," and to ignore the millions who die each year from fossil fuel use.

Thanks for asking.