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The Effect of Hydrolysis on Properties of Soot and Tar During the Pyrolysis of Sewage Sludge

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Abstract

In this study, we evaluate the effect of hydrolysis treatment on the properties of tar and soot produced during the pyrolysis of sewage sludge at different operating temperatures (500–800 °C). The pyrolysis experiments were performed in a two-stage tubular fixed-bed reactor at atmospheric pressure. Raw sludge and hydrolysis-treated sludge (at pressure of 0.4 MPa and temperature 200 °C) samples were collected from local municipal sewage sludge treatment plant. The tar and soot samples obtained from pyrolysis at different temperatures were characterized by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry and scanning electron microscopy with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, respectively. The results showed that increase in the pyrolysis temperature decreases the tar and soot yield for both raw and hydrolysis-treated sludge. The minimum tar yield was achieved with hydrolysis-treated sludge at 800 °C. The soot from raw sludge pyrolysis was of greater yield at high temperature than hydrolysis-treated sludge pyrolysis. The tar from pyrolysis of hydrolysis-treated sludge had more aliphatic character as compared to raw sewage sludge. The formation of heavy polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons during pyrolysis of hydrolysis-treated sludge was lower at high temperatures than that of raw sludge. The aromatic hydrocarbons yield of hydrolysis-treated sludge was higher as compared to raw sludge at 800 °C.

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Acknowledgements

This research was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51576172) and the Environmental Protection Special Funds for Public Welfare (201509013) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities.

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  1. State Key Laboratory of Clean Energy Utilization, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Mujahid Ali, Qunxing Huang, Yafei Wang, Bingcheng Lin, Kai Sun, Yong Chi & Fei Wang

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  1. Mujahid Ali
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Ali, M., Huang, Q., Wang, Y. et al. The Effect of Hydrolysis on Properties of Soot and Tar During the Pyrolysis of Sewage Sludge. Waste Biomass Valor 11, 3433–3442 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12649-019-00685-y

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