Optimization of a Commercial Waste Wood to Syngas and Biofuels Gasification Process

林地生物燃料公司开发了一种低成本的工艺技术，并申请了专利，该技术利用气化和一系列催化反应将废木材和其他生物质资源转化为可再生燃料。伍德兰的示范工厂位于安大略省萨尼亚的生物工业创新中心，2019年，加拿大联邦政府宣布投资近500万美元，使伍德兰能够建立其第一家商业工厂。在准备这次发射时，伍德兰试图确定在气化过程中使用的废木材原料的最佳供应。确定最佳废木材来源至关重要，因为原料的质量决定最终产品的产量和质量，并与商业工厂的设计和运营方式直接相关。

Woodland Biofuels Inc. has developed and patented a low-cost process technology using gasification and a series of catalytic reactions to convert waste wood and other sources of biomass into renewable fuels. Woodland's demonstration plant is located at the Bioindustrial Innovation Centre in Sarnia, Ontario and in 2019, the federal government of Canada announced an investment of nearly $5 million to enable Woodland to build its first commercial plant. In preparation of this launch, Woodland seeks to determine the optimum supply of waste wood feedstock(s) to be used in their gasification process. Identification of the best waste wood sources is of critical importance as the quality of the feedstock drives yield and quality of end products and has direct relevance to how the commercial plant will be designed and operated. Gasification is a thermochemical process in which biomass is converted into synthesis gases (syngas). Many gasification processes require high temperatures, as much as 1300 °C, but Woodland's process takes advantage of a downstream catalytic reformer to reduce the temperature needed to drive the gasification conversion. The gasification process can be harnessed for heat and power applications and syngas constituents can be used as building blocks for production of renewable chemicals such as ammonia and fuels. Because of this promise, there is great interest globally in gasification. However, a key bottleneck to the continued progress of biomass conversion to fuels and chemicals via gasification is the quality and logistics of biomass feedstocks, including waste wood. Utilization of different types of biomass in a gasification process can be beneficial to Woodland in terms of feedstock flexibility, but with this benefit comes challenges around design and operation of the commercial facility as well as potential negative consequences on the quality of the resulting syngas. The overall goal is to evaluate the quality of waste wood available in Ontario and to use these results to inform the design and operation of Woodland Biofuel's commercial gasification facility.