Basic design of a fluidized bed gasifier for rice husk on a pilot scale

With the purpose of contributing to the energetic valuation of the solid wastes generated by the Colombian agricultural industry, a practical methodology for the design of a fluidized bed gasifier for rice husk on pilot scale was developed. The gasifier equipment, made up of a reaction chamber of 0.3 m of internal diameter and 3 m of overall height, was designed from theoretical and experimental information available in the literature and from the past experiences of the research group. A design procedure was elaborated for each one of the seven parts or subsystems in which the gasifier equipment was divided, intending to produce an energetic gas with approximately 70 kW of useful energetic power. Experimental tests performed with a gasifier fabricated according to the designs showed that the developed procedure was adequate, with a maximum deviation close to 50% for the operational performance variables. Therefore, the basic model developed in this work shows that it is helpful for preliminary prediction of the equivalence ratio, low heating value, volumetric yield, gas power and cold efficiency obtained in experimental atmospheric bubbling fluidized bed biomass gasification tests.