Energy Analysis of an Integrated Plant: Fluidized Bed Steam Gasification of Hydrothermally Treated Biomass Coupled to Solid Oxide Fuel Cells

An innovative process based on hydrothermal carbonization, gasification, and solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs) technologies was developed using a commercial process simulation software called ASPEN Plus. The object of this work is to study plant efficiency under various operating conditions. The hydrothermal pre-treatment (HTC) at 200 and 250 °C was modelled as a black box based on the experimental results. The gasifier was modelled as a single reactor vessel with both the fluidized bed steam gasification of solid fuel and the hot gas cleaning system. The SOFC was modelled as a simple grey box with the ASPEN Plus blocks. The effect of HTC temperature and steam/carbon (S/C) ratio on the syngas composition and yield and plant efficiency was studied. The results show that the gasification of hydrochar obtained at 200 °C with S/C ratio of 0.6 gives the best results, namely an energy output of SOFC equal to 1.81 kW/kgBiomass, and overall process efficiency of 36%.