Fe/olivine as primary catalyst in the biomass steam gasification in a fountain confined spouted bed reactor

Abstract The performance of Fe/olivine catalysts was tested in the continuous steam gasification of sawdust in a bench scale plant provided with a fountain confined conical spouted bed reactor at 850 °C. Olivine was used as catalyst support and loaded with 5 wt% Fe. The activity and stability of the catalyst was monitored by nitrogen adsorption-desorption, X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy (XRF), temperature programmed reduction (TPR), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) techniques, which were conducted before and after the runs. The fountain confined conical spouted bed performs well in the biomass steam gasification with primary catalysts. In fact, this reactor allows enhancing the gas-solid contact, and therefore the catalytic activity by avoiding the elutriation of fine catalyst particles. The uncatalysed efficiency of the gasification process, assessed based on the gas production and composition, H2 production, tar concentration and composition, and carbon conversion efficiency, was consideraby improved on the Fe/olivine catalyst, with tar reduction being especially remarkable (to 10.4 g Nm-3). After 140 min on stream, catalyst deactivation was particularly evident, as tar concentration increased to 19.84 g Nm-3 (90% of that without catalyst). However, Fe/olivine catalyst was still active for WGS and CH4 steam reforming reactions, with gas and H2 productions being 1.35 Nm3 kg-1 and 5.44 wt%, respectively. Metal iron oxidation to Fe3O4 caused catalyst deactivation, as the reaction environment shifted from oxidizing to reducing conditions due to operational limitations.