Wood Gasification Integrated with Fuel Cells

Exhaust Gases Air In

Out
Dried Gas Cleaning Fuel Cell

Wood Wood
In

Hot Electricity
Gases Out
Wood Dryer Gasifier

Ash Tars,
Out Dust

D. R. McIlveen-Wright, B. C. Williams and J. T. McMullan,

Northern Ireland Centre for Energy Research and Technology, University of Ulster,
Coleraine BT52 1SA
Northern Ireland
 Simplified Block Diagram of a Fuel Cell Integrated Wood Gasification System

Air in O2 Separator

N2, etc.
Exhaust
gases
Wet Gas Cleaning Shifter Fuel Cell
O2 in
wood
Electricity
in
out

Wood Dryer Gasifier Heat Exchangers

Heat
Exchangers
Ash Tars, Water In
Out Dust

Steam
and/or Hot
Water
Why biomass and fuel cells?
Biomass Which Biomass Gasifier?
•Renewable fuel •Koppers-Totzek low pressure, oxygen
blown, entrained flow gasifier
•Low Sox and Nox emissions •Originally developed for coal
•Low, or zero, CO2 emissions, if grown •Feedstock must be small and uniform
•H2/CO < 1, Shift reactor needed for
sustainably.
PAFC to increase H2/CO
..
•Low methane levels in gas, no methane
reformer necessary
Fuel Cells
•Very efficient, clean, small-scale electricity
generation systems

Molten Carbonate Fuel Cell Phosphoric Acid Fuel Cell

•Operates at 600-700oC
• Operates at 200oC
•Insensitive to CO2
• Can tolerate 1-2% CO
•Can use CO as well as hydrogen as fuel • Waste heat can be used for ‘shift reaction’
•High temperature waste heat could provide high • Waste heat can also be used for space heating or
grade steam hot water
•Lower temperature waste heat can also be used
for space heating or hot water
 Economic Data
• Break-Even Electricity Selling Price
B_E Electricity Selling Price v. Wood
(BESP) falls as plant size increases,
Input
then reaches a plateau.
• Electricity from the WG- MCFC 25
system is cheaper to produce than
from the WG-PAFC. 20
• BESP for the WG-PAFC is similar to
wood combustion systems of the
15

p/kW h
same size I.e. it is expensive! PAFC
• BESP for the WG-MCFC is similar MCFC
10
to that for the wood gasification-gas
engine systems I.e. it is relatively
cheap. 5
• Economics for novel technologies
are difficult to assess, so these are 0
“Best Estimate” data. 0 5 10 15 20
daf Tonnes/day
 Technical Data
• The WG-MCFC system is the Electrical Efficiency v. Wood Input
most efficient of all small ( < 500
kWe ) wood-fuelled electricity 30
generation systems.
• The WG-PAFC system has a 25
similar electrical efficiency to
small wood combustion 20
systems.

% LHV
PAFC
• The WG-PAFC system provides 15
MCFC
a large amount of low grade
waste heat, making it suitable for 10
CHP applications.
5

0
0 5 10 15 20
daf Tonnes/day