Oxygen blown steam gasification of different kinds of lignocellulosic biomass for the production of hydrogen-rich syngas

In this study, the gasification performance of different kinds of lignocellulosic biomass, including corn straw (CS), soybean straw (SS), cotton straw (CTS), rice straw (RS), wheat straw (WS), bamboo wood (BW), maple sawdust (MS), and pine sawdust (PS), was studied in a tube furnace reactor system under identical conditions (temperature = 800 °C, oxygen flow rate = 30 mL/min, steam flow rate = 5 ± 1 mL/min, and time = 55 min). SS showed good gasification characteristics and delivered the highest H₂ yield of 28.96 mol/kg. By using the SS, additional optimization was carried out by considering different temperatures (650, 700, 750, 850, 950, and 1050 °C) and different oxygen flow rates (10, 20, 30, 40, and 50 mL/min). After optimization, the initial temperature and oxygen concentration were reduced to 750 °C and 10 mL/min, respectively. An H₂ yield of 30.86 mol/kg was achieved with an increase of 6.56 %. Finally, catalytic steam gasification employing three potassium-based catalysts, KCl, KOH, and K₂CO₃ was tested using SS. KOH and K₂CO₃ performed distinctly better than KCl. The utilization of KOH as a catalyst resulted in the greatest H₂ yield, measuring 39.22 mol/kg, which represents a notable improvement of 27.09 %.